just checked the tester, its down 1 psi, but no drips coming out from the bell housing yet. before i retorqued you could watch the pressure drop on the tester, so i'm hoping this is good news.

Replace your t-stat.

Why not order new tension bolt seals? Then clean up what you can and install the new o-rings. But yes, do-not unload all of the tension bolts. Replace them one by one and use the torque sequence until you're at the specification...

i will if its not holding pressure still after a few hours, i just don't understand how a fresh rebuild can have bad seals on almost all of the tension bolts. I'd say all but about 4 had drips from the heads of the bolts,

There is no guarrantee, but I would NOT just re-torque the bolts. I would replace the sealing washers.

I'm guessing that when the engine was rebuilt, they re-used sealing washers that "looked good." The problem with re-using any o-ring is that once used, they take a set/harden in the previous configuration and will never conform to the next application's geometry as well as new ones would. Sometimes you can get away with the used ones, sometimes not.

As sgtblue says, replace them with new ones and avoid as many problems as possible.

Dave

looks like i'll be doing that this winter. its still leaking. i still don't understand why 4 of the bolts are allen drive and have nuts locking them in place

I recently learned of a tstat that fails in the open position:

http://www.motoradusa.com/products/f...rmo/index.html

AutoZone sells it for the FD: FailSafe Thermostat

Anybody tried this?

I don't either. Never heard of those. Do you have a picture of them?
If you think they could have contributed to your issues, try posting a WTB in the "For Sale" section for some used tension bolts and replace those along with the sealing washers.

OK, stupid question. IIRC, the normal tension bolts supposed to screw into threads in the front housing. Where are the nuts you are talking about? On the rear?

If so, then, if I understand your description correctly, for some reason they apparently used studs with Allen sockets in their ends (some studs are made this way), and used nuts to provide the tension. And, if this is the case, then the coolant is probably leaking past (through) the threads between the nuts and the studs.

In this case, get the proper tension bolts and new sealing washers, and your problem should be solved.

Or, you could seal the nuts to the bolts using Loctite, or something similar. However, the best bet would be to use the proper bolts.

Dave