Well, I was in the process of attempting the replacement of the exhaust manifold donuts where the exhaust manifold connects to the down pipe. A couple questions -

There is only 2 studs, should there be three?

One of the nuts just spins on the stud, assuming its stripped?

Would it be in my best interest to just replace the manifold with a new one as opposed to fighting the damn studs and nuts?

It appears that my truck is from Cali as it has different smog stuff on it, will any manifold work?

Thanks.

 

There is three studs on my 85. You should have three also. When I went to replace mine I snapped all three. Consider yourself lucky. I bought replacement studs at autozone. They had a selection of generic studs and I just brought mine in and matched it up.