I'm only gonna say this to be helpful, so I'm not trying to be a jackass here, just trying to be logical in the interest of helping you solve your problem:
If you are still having trouble, using the correct size copper washers, my money is on the sanding of the FD surfaces caused them to be "out of plane" to a degree the washer cant compensate. Again, not trying to be an ass, but I would never do sand surfaces of rare devices like that. I know you can't go back in time, but those surfaces likely were machined perfectly flat. It's VERY hard to go at a flat metal surface with your hand and sandpaper and come away with a perfect surface.
The good news, in my eyes, is this. those surfaces on your FD are either f**ked or they arent. So "over torquing" the banjo bolts is, in some way, maybe a risk worth taking? aluminum has more give than copper, as I understand it-copper apparently has a higher "desire to return to it's original shape". It may be worth trying aluminum.
Also, if you are jumpering the FP relay, one thing I have done in the past with fiber washers is to run the pump, if the leak is small, and tighten the bolt in real time, continually wiping the joint with a paper towel or rubber glove. you just go til you can't feel leakage.
100% agree it shouldn't be this much trouble, this fuel system design seems absolutely crazy to me. I count 23 bolts in the engine bay; 22 have 8 mating surfaces each which may potentially leak, and the FD return has 12 surfaces (3 washers), for a total of 188 surfaces that may potentially leak highly flammable fuel into a hot engine bay. I don't know how this could have passed the engineering safety review, horrible design IMO (obviously somewhat tinged by my current predicament).
Regardless, to begin I was using some cheap click type torque wrenches (harbor freight) that I had, I find these a bit finicky because as I recall you're supposed to dial the setting all the way up/down before setting the torque value. I sheared one of the bolts using these as I mentioned earlier, so I purchased an AC-Delco digital torque wrench just specifically for this job. Presumably there is a strain gauge of some form, internally calibrated to measure torque in ft-lbs, in-lbs, N-M, etc. Beeps with increasing frequency to solid tone when torque is reached (sometimes it's hard to read the digital readout due to angle). Pretty straight forward to use.
I'm using the torque specs found on page D:02:01 of the Workshop Manual:
M8 bolt: 7-9 FT LBs
M10 bolt: 9-11 FT LBs
M12 bolt: 14-17 FT LBs
I don't believe that I'm using the tools incorrectly, or the wrong torque values, but correct me if I'm wrong, although at this point the torque values seem more of a suggestion than a rule.
Currently my thinking is that there may be some surface imperfection I can't see, such as being out of plane on the FD, or maybe the new fuel lines were damaged or deformed some how. I was careful handling and gave them a cursory inspection before installation and they seemed fine to my eye. It may also be that I must use the DPI provided crush washers with their lines; I do notice the washer diameter is larger on DPI original washers vs the DMCH ones I purchased. Everything was pretty crusty in the engine bay (see injector photo) which is weird because the car is otherwise pretty cherry.
I may try reinstalling the old lines again just to see what happens, do these leak now? I can do that for the WUR but I ended up having to cut the main line to get the fuel filter out so that option is not available. Unfortunately, next steps seem to me to be things such as removing and possibly replacing the WUR, or FD cover, or ordering (some) new lines from somewhere else; all these are quite expensive shot gun approaches that I'm not too keen on.
Originally Posted by Jonathan
I agree with Ron in what he said about you shouldn't be having this much trouble and something weird must be going on...
Is there any chance your torque wrench calibration or function is off? Like maybe you thought you were torqueing the bolts to a certain value, but in reality you weren't?
Can you show us the torque wrench you are using and the values you are torqueing to on these bolts?
how many locations do you have leaking? is it just one? if you name the exact fittings that are leaking, that can help deduce. in short, if you have one leaking, that could be dirt/product error. if you have several leaks, being frank here, this is likely user error or a "resurfacing" issue, related to sanding of the surfaces. if you have a leak at the WUR and at the FD, did you resurface both of those?
i think it's hjighly unlikely any of the major retailers sold you lines with errors of the kind you are talking about.
if you managed to shear a bolt off by sheer torque,you are using waaaay too much torque. banjo bolts dont have the integrity/stability of a normal bolt; you're lucky this is the case, cause if you stripped the threads of either, you'd be in a much worse position. is it possible that you have been torquing the living shit out of the bolts, backing them out, and then retightening them? if so, i could see that being the culprit.
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Originally Posted by Jonathan
