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Owner Comments on Loctite TSB 03-14-1

new 7/21/03


This is a pathetic cruel joke. I was the the first one to research this idea and Paul Nimz and I the first two to ever Loctite our cars. It is little better than nothing but gives some comfort if the car is low mileage, cams are 100% and you plan to weld soon anyway.

We have had our first Loctited failure, .Ernie Roberts - Loctited - Cam Failure #272   

We never recommended Loctite as a permanent fix.  Loctite Solution

 I suspect the new cams with new part numbers may be just the same old design with Loctite, which is not sufficient. Hence the community recommendation to weld NEW cams. 

RE:  Some owners of V8 Taurus SHO vehicles may be making inappropriate or unnecessary modifications to increase the life of the camshafts. Camshaft failures are uncommon, even at high mileage. However, for those owners wishing to do so, this article provides an appropriate procedure that may extend the life of the camshafts.

Not rare, not uncommon, not inappropriate, not unnecessary.

Ford is two years behind the learning curve. They are either amazingly ill-informed of the depth and breath of the pandemic or the lying lawyers are forming engineering policy again.

By the time this goes to trial the only V8 SHO left will be welded. And the Ford lawyers will have to choke on that.

Comments? Send them here. I'll post them.

Buford


That is absurd! Thanks Don for getting the info. 

Kirk J Doucette
NESHOC President


I thought this was a joke, but it is serious???? That is AMAZING!!!

James Jensen


I want to believe this is a joke. Unfortunately, it's not April 1st. These morons at Ford are much worse than we ever imagined. Yes, I know Ford may be monitoring this list. I really don't care.

Glen Murdock

I can't help but wonder, if there is no problem, then why the proposed solution? Paradoxical, don't you think?

Larry Eck
97TR
Unauthorized Welds


To me, this is Ford's legal team's way of trying to look pro-active on assisting owners while attempting to discredit the lawsuit at the same time. The addition of one of the lines serves to cover their collective booties should a Loctite'd cam give way after performing this Authorized service: "Measure the gap on all four camshafts as per Figure 1. If the gap is wider than 0.047" (1.19mm) on any camshaft, only the out of specification camshaft must be replaced as per the camshaft replacement procedure in the Workshop Manual." While this is a good way to make sure that they don't lose their shirts when (not if) a loctited came gives way, I think the legal team may have overlooked an important point.

By having the gap measured, they admit that at a certain gap, the cam is irreversibly damaged and MUST be replaced to avoid engine failure. However, it also seems to be a tacit admission that the gap clearance is either a) incorrect from the factory, or b) increasing during the life of the engine. There are no other options as to why it needs to be checked. In either case, it's a further admission that this is indeed a problem. I would be curious to see the number of cams that fail this gap test, and how the "necessary replacement" is handled.

If this is a TSB designed for "concerned customers," then who foots the bill? Who foots the bill if a cam is out of spec and needs to be replaced? Can the dealer, in good conscience, only Loctite 3 and refuse to replace the 4th, even though it's out of spec by Ford's own admission? Who foots the bill when one of these camshafts gives out (and it will)?

Larry, might want to ask The Team about my thoughts on the tacit admission thing. Ford's lawyers seem to know how to bad-mouth, but they may have jumped the gun in their eagerness to discredit us...

-John B


I wonder if this explains the blue stuff Eric Lehmann noticed on one of the new cams he purchased. Does this particular Loctite stuff have that greenish color to it? 

Is Ford possibly putting Loctite on new cams now? This really makes me wonder about that.

At least this is an indication that Ford is getting sick of people asking dealerships to weld their cams. The word is certainly out...

Scott Krietemeyer
99 TG
96 MG - still a work in progress.

For those who were unsubbed during the convention here is what he sent: Image he sent is also attached:



So I bought one of the new front head camshafts through FPN, Thanx Torrie. It cost me 129.00 and seems to be identical with the original cam.

While looking it over I noticed a couple of paint marks here and there but was taken back a bit when I saw a green paint/sealer BETWEEN the sprocket and the turning nut. I've attached a picture of the cam.

Is Ford marking or loctiting these pieces? 

Regards
Eric Lehmann
97 ebony welded
97 TR under the knife right now
91 Jade Plus SHOfa 


I think it very odd they recommend a Loctite product that is no longer made.  Read below.  -Tim


11/09/02

Hi Tim, My name is Phil Silano and I have a 98 SHO, Black with just under 65K miles. I bought the car two years ago with 32K miles from our local Ford dealer. It belonged to the owners nephew. I came across your website about two weeks ago when I was looking for info on service requirements for the timing belts. The manual didn't list any but I wanted to be 100% sure, your site answered that question, no service needed. Unfortunately reading about all the cam failures made me absolutely paranoid. I wouldn't even turn on the radio so I could hear every noise from under the hood. My wife and I love this car, so getting rid of it was not an option. I'm a pretty good backyard mechanic so today I dove in to repair the cams using the Loctite option. Both the pinning and welding options made me very uncomfortable. I work in aerospace and know a bit about the properties of various metals and the problems that can be caused by doing something without a full knowledge of the stresses that are being induced into the parts. After reading through the data sheet on the Loctite it seemed like a safe approach. I'm still concerned about thermal expansion of the metal parts and the Loctite but everything has some risk involved. Whoever posted the valve cover removal procedure, thank you, thank you, thank you. You saved me a lot of time and effort. Anyway, I started at 10:15 this morning and had the valve covers off by 12:30. I didn't remove the rear surge tank supports from the head, instead I took the intake runners off the top of the surge tank. More bolts but much easier to reach. Putting the surge tank back in was a little hard to position but not too bad, about ten minutes. A word to the wise, DO NOT clip the end of the Loctite bottle applicator. Use a pin hole. I forgot the description of the Loctite procedure someone else posted on your site. I clipped the applicator and had one hell of a time controlling the flow from the bottle. BTW, Loctite 294 doesn't seem to be available any more, the new number is 290. Also used Loctite cleaner/primer 7679. Just for the hell of it I tried the Loctite on two pieces of steel left over from another project. This stuff cures hard and holds like ..., well like Loctite. Put it all back together and finished about 5:30. It may be my imagination but the car seems to run better. A few of the clamps on the intake runners seemed loose so some small leaks may have been fixed in the process. One other suggestion, wash the engine before starting, remove the pretty cover and wash it again. Let it dry completely then go to work.


The key phrase is "...may extend the life...". It also may not. 

WELDS DO! Can you hear me now Mr. Fud?

Karl H. Kramer, Jr. 


(fine print)

In a double blind study Loctite has proven more effective than a placebo in 50% of cases. 

In rare cases owners had severe side effects like bent valves, cracked pistons, and launched motors. Always consult your physician, not suitable for pregnant wimmin. If your motor barfs and your wallet empties discontinue use but continue making car payments.

Dr Buford


...now.

I stopped at the beer store on my way home from work today.
Put the suds in the trunk, got in and fired up the car.
Just as I reached for the radio button - 
I hear taptaptaptap (!?!?!?!)
Hand immediately diverts to ignition switch
I hear every one of you yelling SHUT IT OFF!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! at the top of your lungs.
I did just that.
And I am welded. 
The beads of sweat were rolling.
The tapping kept right on going. 
So I did not increment the grim counter today.
There were three guys two rows over working on a Nissan Pickup - with a hammer.
Whew - relieved - I cleaned my pants out, fired it up and headed for home.
Tru story - Thanks everybody.
Loctite huh? - YEAH - OKAY! 

Karl H. Kramer, Jr.
'99 TR - welded


And you know the first thing Ford will say when a loctited cam fails......

"The Loctite was improperly applied and that's why the cam failed".

Idiots.

Fords customer service has really taken a dump. Now more than ever.

Mark Hlady
1999 Black
Welded...because Ford won't back up their mistake


"push it outside", "24 Hours to cure" or 10 minutes to weld!!!!!!

jj
Too many to count


I agree with this much,

RE: Adding Loctite 294 to the camshafts may extend the life of the bond between the camshaft gear and the tube. This procedure is appropriate for engines not experiencing upper engine valve train noise. If such noise is present, replacement of a camshaft may be required.

I would not buy Loctite stock over this, How many V8SHO are left that are not welded? Not too many.

If dealerships charge $1300 to inspect the camshafts, how much more to loctite & clean the butterflies & replace the plugs and put most of the parts back together?

Once again, if you have noise you already have a cam failure, try not to have an engine failure.

Buford


Buford,

The latest information regarding the Ford copyrighted Technical Service Bulletin Article No. 03-14-1 comes at a very interesting time. Is Ford now recommending I expose an untested, unproven foreign substance to the lubrication system of a very expensive high performance engine? If, as they have until only recently claimed, they had no knowledge of a problem with the V8 cam sprockets, then how can they publish this bulletin at this time? To do so is to admit that they are either incompetent as engineers by recommending an un-proven fix or have been liars all along.

I personally believe they are both. We all know they have lied about their knowledge of this problem for several years. Their competency is demonstrated by the design of their cam and sprocket assembly. For those who still believe in Ford and hope this is an easy fix I would caution against this.

Reviewing the Technical Data Sheet for Loctite Product 294, I was interested in some of the information found on Page 2 of the document. Column 1 includes a graph illustrating the hot strength of this product. At 150C to 200C (302F to 392F for our English system folks) the product only retains about 30% of its Room Temperature strength.

Further down the column we find this product’s resistance to motor oil as a solvent. Here we learn that after only 500 hours at 125C (25,000 miles at 50 miles per hour with no time out to be parked overnight or at the office) the initial strength is reduced to only 64%. This comes to a hot strength at 500 hours (that’s not quite 21 days) of about 20% of the initial strength. There is nothing to indicate the additional loss of strength when exposed to mechanical shock and vibration or heat/cool cycles.

The document further indicates the product should be stored between 46F and 82F and that "Optimal storage is at the lower half of this temperature range". That’s 46F to 64F and I doubt there are any industrial suppliers keeping this stuff in a refrigerated warehouse. That said, no one can tell exactly what value this product has in preventing the cam sprocket from failing. It appears from the published data that it will be ineffective, at best. 

Finally, Loctite’s website has a document on bonding that includes the following paragraph highlighted (by them) in italics:

"This chart is not to be used to specify adhesives without specific testing. It is recommended that you conduct on-part testing to insure adhesive performance before specifying any adhesive."

The question now is, has Ford done extensive tests on this product? Based on the above, I doubt it. I think they’re on the run and looking for a rock to hide under. Weld ‘em or Pin ‘em, either is a good fix if done right. I'm welding because I can't afford to pin two of these.

Mike Durko, PE
1996 Silver (Failure #277)
1999 Silver


Mike,

Difficult to test what nobody can buy, but easy to recommend. Loctite 294 has not been for sale since almost a year ago. 



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