Engine: 70 T5: Exhaust manifold studs: nuts too tight?

[classicswede]

I would go with a time sert every time over a helicoil. They are much stronger and if they do fail do not cause the kind of damage a helicoil will

[Distendo]

Ok, an update...

This is before fitting the cylinder head onto the block.

What I ended up doing was using an old stud, held in a vice by the two nuts I tightened (locked) against one another to keep it still, while I screwed each of the new locknuts (one after the other) onto it, to 'loosen them up' a little.

I then used a dab of Tippex (correction fluid) on the base of each stud in the head, so I could see whether it turned as I screwed a (loosened) locknut onto it until the stud thread protruded through the locknut.

I removed the locknuts and put each one into an envelope marked to id the stud it'd been fitted onto.

Cyl head back on, fitted the locknuts matched to their stud, all seemed to go well (apart from the inaccesibility of the studs when the head's in place ).

I appreciate that this may appear to be a mountain/molehill issue, and that in 'loosening' the nuts a little I lost some resistance to their coming undone and that it's only my sense of what resistance would suffice, but that's what I did. Proof of the pudding is in the few ten thousand miles later...

That is, if I can get the #*@%ing timing belt back on (currently have a choice between it going round either the exhaust cam sprocket or the water pump).