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The day I realized I was torquing head bolts backwards

Been doing diesel work for 8 years. Always followed the torque sequence by the book. But last month on a Cummins ISX rebuild, I had a head gasket fail at 500 miles. Shop foreman came over, watched me run the torque wrench. He just laughed. Said I was going counter-clockwise on the final pass. I had the sequence right but the rotation wrong the whole time. No idea how many jobs I messed up before. Anyone else ever have a basic step completely backwards for years?
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2 Comments
wesley_grant33
Did you ever figure out how many engines you might have done that on over the years?
3
umaprice
umaprice1mo ago
Wait, you mean I could've been doing it backwards this whole time and nobody noticed until 500 miles later? That's rough buddy. At least your foreman caught it before you torqued the whole thing into orbit or something... I once spent a whole afternoon trying to start a lawnmower before realizing I was pulling the cord backwards. Guess we all got our blind spots, huh?
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