Well, I managed to shear the heads off of 2 of the bolts that hold my valve cover on, on my d16y8 Civic. Any ideas on how to get the broken pieces out of the holes without destroying the threads? I tighted it back down with the remaining 3 bolts, and it seems to hold for now, but Im not going to do any heavy driving till I get this fixed… Any suggestions?
*no swearing in thread titles 
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youll be fine. if anything use hondabond or something to help seal it. Im wondering what shape the motor is in if the se bolts arent coming out. Was it ever overheated?? posibly the head is gettinf distorted from warpage and grabbing the bolts?? or maybe it was some random freak thing.
Never overheated, last compression test was absolutely perfect on all 4. So you think I can run it with no real problems with only 3 of the 5 bolts fastened? I drove for about 15 minutes with it like this, and there were no Oil leaks or anything, but Im still kinda wary about that.
you’ll be fine don’t worry about it … int he mean time get some new bolts … they unscrew from the head itself
Yeah. Well the problem is that it was more that the bolts snapped, and didnt just have the heads shear off. Meaning : Half of the threaded part is stuck in there. Any experience removing a broken bolt from a very sensative area? i.e.: a head?
Yeah be very careful and use an ez-out. I would spray some PB blaster or something like that on the threads or in the hole first. If you don’t feel comfortable doing it you could always pay a shop to do it.
If you broke them while tightening them there is a good chance an easy out will work.
People get in trouble with those things when they’re removing a rusted/seized bolt and it breaks off. Since it should take less torque to back it out than you were putting on it when it broke I’d try the easy out. If it feels like it’s not going to come out though just quit, because having a broken easy out stuck in the broken bolt is going to make it a whole lot worse.
these things only get like 8ft/lbs what the hell were you tightening them with… a breaker bar?
as stated, an easy out should take care of it. then just chase the threads.
or
buy a second head (i have a corfe laying around) and build it, then swap it.
I was thinking that myself but didn’t want to say it since I’ve never worked on a Honda. I figured there was a chance that they might make of for their lack of torque at the crank with torque at the valve cover bolts ;). I kid, I kid.
yeah use an easy out … owrst case snenario i guess is drill it out and use helicoil :shrug:
ide have to assume that he was trying to take them out, not tighten em
No… I was hacing my retard friend tighten them, and he was using his impact… They are tiny bolts, I dont know if I can even use an easy out on them… :-/. I guess Ill just take it by 
a dealership this week.
lol, impact for valve cover nuts? he must be a lazy lazy person.
yes, bastard. But he lets me use his garage/tools, so meh… Thats what I get. woo hoo, I just clearcoated the cover… It kinda didnt work the way I hoped though.
Ok, well the damn bolt extractor didnt work Im really kinda dejected about this whole thing. I love my baby, and I’m sad to see it fucked up… Any other ideas?? I took the matching size drill bit and put a hole in the broken bolt as close to center as a could, then I took the easy out thing and tried to run that into the drilled hole. It didnt really do anything but spin, though… Any ideas about where I can get it like drilled out and retapped or something? i really dont want to lose this head, its more or less perfect.
helicoil
like i said before and zer0daze just said you drill it out and use helicoil
I AM GOD. I fucking got to Lowes AS they locked the door, but I got them to let me in, I got the next size up of bolt extractor, put it in the holes I drilled and hammered it in a couple times, and those bastards came out!! I am so happy… haha… Thanks everyone for all of the help, :-). Now I know what to do in the future when this happens.
wow an impact wrench on a valve cover, talk about overkill. Glad to see u got them out. Ide say dont let ur lazy friend work on ur car anymore
Yep, already established that with him, haha… Now all I need to do is go and pick up some new bolts from Honda