Many of you have already traveled this path already,,,so this post is mostly for folks contemplating this repair in the future. A couple weeks ago my thermostat stuck shut <> resulting in both heads cracking. Pulling the heads on a B2 with its cramped engine compartment can be an old fashioned knuckle scraping journey . #1- Late 80's wiring can be a little helter skelter.#2- Be prepared for the possibility that every plastic harness connection clip may break,,accept it and carry on.#3-Labeling wires and organizing pulled bolts/ components takes time,,accept it and carry on.#4- Dont be suprised at all if you find that bolts are seized in place,,even if you have used penetrating oil on them twice a day for a week prior. All of my exhaust manifold bolts were seized in the heads/manifolds/ehaust pipe connector,,matter of fact,,they were seized enough that I snapped in half a 2 inch,,1/2 inch drive extension.<> plan B ,means you pull the heads out with the manifolds attached. Smile,,give $50 to a machine shop to rehab the manifolds,,,Accept it and carry on.#5- It pays to shop around for heads,,,I checked around at 5 places/vendors for replacement heads,,,and Autozone had a pair for $570 exchange,,and as I wrote that down and was walking away to think about it,,the manager said if I could find a better price,,,,he could do better on his price.SO I went online,,found a new pair of OE replacement heads(sadly not World Product heads) for just under $200 apiece,,printed the info off,,,and returned to Autozone with the specs of the deal ,,and he lowered his price DOWN to match it ,and I recieved them two days later and was able to spend my money locally. ***I also replaced the orings and 1 leaking injector while everything was apart. I vacumed out every water/oil passage way I could find and changed the oil/filter twice,,,and so far its running good smooth.<>My hands are beat up and my wallet is lighter,, but if this motor lasts another 20 thousand miles my efforts will pay off financially.

 

WP heads for $570/pair with exchange is a darn good price in itself, as fully assembled units usually run around $300+ each! And yes, he's right, if you plan on pulling the heads, plan on snapping off all the exhaust manifold bolts and having to drill them out or have a machine shop repair your exhaust manifolds or buying new manifolds.

On another note on his ordeal... I would have replaced all 6 injectors while I was at it, but that's just me. Glad to hear things went well for you and you got 'er back up and running, though!!

 

glad to hear you got your rig back up and running! i went through the same ordeal back in the summer of 2005 with my 86 every single wire harness connector clip broke,only had 1 cracked head so i just had to replace the one,which i got from a friend that works at a local machine shop,had the other one refurbished,as for the manifold bolts,i used a grinder to cut the bolt heads off to remove the manifold,then used all new bolts,other side only 1 broke off,i rechased threads and was all set

 

The commas are odd but the point is good, the heads are way easier to pull if you just plan to pull them with the exhaust manifolds and deal with them later.

 

Yep, I would have liked to have a new batch of uniform injectors,,,but at 50$ a piece,,it just wasnt feasable at this moment of time.***I also removed the plastic inner fenders to promote access to the motor area,and it helped on many bolts. I also installed a Fail Safe thermostat,,,cause if I would have had one in the motor three weeks ago,,,this whole teardown could have been avoided .

 

$50 a piece??? You could have ordered a set of Accel performance injectors for around $240 (unless their prices went up since last I checked) from truckperformance.com, all the way up to 21lb injectors, if I remember right. Probably with S&H, etc., it might be closer to $300 for a set of six, but either option would be worth it in the long run... even with OEM replacements (new or rebuilt). You would have also had 5 spare injectors just in case. I can relate, though, sometimes the $$$ isn't quite there to replace 'em all. Just glad to hear you got 'er fixed... thankfully, I haven't had any issues on mine, other than being a little tempermental... although, I am wondering if I need to overhaul the distributor and replace all my injectors... !