Head bolts rusting

[TspeED3]

Seems like everyone is doing head work at the moment.

I lifted the head on my Tiger on the weekend with the plan to do a quick swap for a spare head I picked up a while ago (original valves are about to pop through the old one...) My quick swap plan fell in a large hole when I found some of the head bolts looked like this (sorry for crappy photo pics):



Anyone seen this before? The one on the exhaust right hand side was the worst and the only one with a distinct notch in it but two others at the front of the head and the back left one had significant corrosion build up.

I have ordered eight new ones but just curious if it is a common thing.

[esox]

Yes I have seen it on a few motors, could be down to the coolant losing it,s corrosion protection properties. The majority of corroded bolts have been on the kick stand side. This could be due to a build up of solids, caused by the bike being on it,s kick stand for a long period.

[t552]

poor coolant properties

[TspeED3]

Yeah I mean to add that there is a bit of sludge in the bottom of the water jacker and it seems thickest in the front RH corner(where the worst bolt was)
The bike has spent most of the time I have had it on it centre stand and when I bought it the guy had it on the centre stand as well.

Ah well, hope this is the worst of it and I will just give it all a good clean before I lift the liners.

[desmodave1766]

I had exactly the same issue with my ex race bike engine. In its 18 year history it does not appear it ever had any anti freeze. Result 3 of the head bolts were sufficiently rusted and waisted that the bolts snapped upon strip down resulting in the crankcases having togoto an engineering shop to remove the remnants. Anti freeze has anti corrosion properties and must be changed every 2 years, topping up is not good enough! You have been warned!

[esox]

It seems that if you do not change out coolant as per the recomendations, impending doom awaits the unfortunate. Caterpillar offer a coolant condition that provides superior corrosion protection propertities for extended use. Please do not forget to use distilled water for your coolant charge.

[triplestrength]

I had one rust through on my Trophy, on the camchain side. PO had not used antifreeze, head gasket blew coolant in sump etc.
Replace Antifreeze good advice I'd say.
Rather expensive mess otherwise.

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[TspeED3]

Just got back from holidays with the family and picked up the new bolts I had ordered from WoT that were waiting at the post office for me. They are ~10mm longer than the old ones!?! I ordered the right ones based on VIN number but I would have thought that this was not something that would have changed throughout the T3/4 engine series.

Does anyone know if this is going to cause me problems?

The only other possibility that just occurred to me is that they sent me bolts for the first of the injected Tigers. That would be very ****.