I read an older post on here from 2-3 years back that had some good info on these valve cover bolts. As I am sure most of you know, the bolt consists of a bolt, the metal sleeve, a grommet, and a washer. I assume the grommet is something like rubber when new, but on my 18 year old 146k engine, they are like hard plastic. The metal sleeve appears to be something that prevents over torquing the bolts. The washer sits under the bolt head and when tightened presses down on the grommet and it is the grommet that presses down on the valve cover. The grommet also passes through the hole in the valve cover. So on 10 of mine, the grommet (which has a small lip on the bottom) is hard enough that I can't remove the bolt assembly from the valve cover without risking cracking the hardened grommet. On 3 of them, the part of the grommet that fits down in the hole of the valve cover is broken off, and on one of them the grommet is split. Unfortunately these are no longer made.

I assume many others have encountered this but I haven't found what is the best solution. Some just use the old hard (or even cracked) grommets and reassemble. Others rig something. And I have also seen someone suggest using the Mazda Speed3/CX7/Speed 6 bolts LFBL-10-237. If you check a Mazda parts page, they claim it doesn't fit a B series truck, but even if the bolt does not fit, I would assume there is a chance the grommet could be taken off and moved to the old bolt. I kind of want to try the LFBL-10-237, but if I buy locally from a Mazda dealer I think there are about $15-$20 each and with 14 bolts, that gets ridiculous really fast. I found some one eBay for about $11 each, but it would take a week and a half to get them and the seller doesn't have enough of them. Has anyone used these?

 

I ordered 1 of the Mazda bolts just to see if it will work, but the side profile picture I have seen makes me think it likely won't. I have also seen one for the 4.0L Rangers (2001+) on PartsGeek that looks like it might work. But after seeing this video:


I decided on an easier solution. The guy in the video has to fabricate the metal sleeve part from a longer spacer. I am thinking of using the original bolt and sleeve and just breaking the original hardened grommet and the washer off of the bolt. Then buying a grommet and regular washer that will fit over the metal sleeve. I was concerned about the temperature since some rubbers are only good to 170-240 F and some high temp rubber is only good down to 10 F. So I went to McMaster-Carr and found:

EPDM Grommet 9600K314 Overall diameter is 5/8" (original is around 0.050" more), the ID where the metal collar will fit is 3/8" (the collar OD is just around 0.015" smaller so it might be just a fraction loose), and the part that will fit down in the hole of the valve cover is 7/16". The temp range is -60 to 300F, it is rated "medium hard" and is oil resistant.

https://www.mcmaster.com/9600K314/

Passivated 18-8 Steel Washer 98017A200 Overall diameter is 5/8" (same as the grommet I'm buying), and the hole in the middle is 0.390" which is almost exactly the same as the diameter of the lip on the bottom of the metal sleeve on the original bolt. The thickness is around 1/16".

https://www.mcmaster.com/98017A200/

So the washer should slip on over the lip on the metal collar, then the grommet (after I cut the bottom half of it off) should stretch enough to go over that lip and fit fairly well on the main part of the collar.

The total cost for $100 of each was $18.

 

I purchased the steel washers and grommets from McMaster Carr and I think they would have worked fine. Also I purchased the Mazda LFBL-10-237 and it would have worked as well, but would have cost me $170 for 14 of them. But after comparing the rubber on the new Mazda bolt to the grommet, I thought the grommet rubber was a bit too soft and I decided to go to a local salvage yard and pull 14 off of a 2008 Mazda CX-7 and this is what I ended up using.

 

Wow, I just went through this. I found a set of valve cover bolts on Amazon meant for a 2005-2007 AUDI A4 for $25 that would probably work out of the box. Instead I used the grommets from the Audi bolts on my Ranger bolts. In this pic, the Audi bolt is on top and the Ranger bolt with the Audi grommet is on the bottom. Maybe this will help someone. Here is what I bought.

2007 Audi A4 bolts

2007 Audi A4 bolts

.

Amazon

Amazon

 

Hey guys, how have these held up since you've installed them? I'm looking to do my valve cover seal and I'm having a hard time deciding what to do about these bolts.

 

Mine seem to be holding up well. No problems yet with the Audi grommets.

 

Thanks for your reply! I’ve got one more question now that I’ve got the valve cover off.

I bought the set of Audi bolts, as well as a single Mazda bolt to test fit. The Mazda bolt looks pretty close, but the spacer is too long. The grommet on the Audi bolt is longer than the stock grommet. Did you cut the grommet to size to match the ranger bolt or did you just use it as is? It doesn’t seem like the extra length would affect the bolt torque, but it would decrease the length between the end of the grommet and the end of the spacer.

Oh, and one more question. How do you get the old grommet off the bolt? Mine is super stuck on.

 

Hi Chuck, I just pulled the Audi grommets off and used them on the Mazda bolts/spacers as is. Soak the old bolts in gas over night to help separate the old grommets from the spacers. Some of them were so hard that I had to chip them off with a flat blade. I think the Audi grommets are very close to the thickness of the Mazda grommets when they were new, before the heat and time caused them to be brittle and hard. So far it is working.

 

I'm now having the same issue all of you had couple years ago I'm trying to take the cheapest/quickest route since ive already spent way too much money on everything and ive gone 2 weeks without being able to work because of this issue would using the 2008 Mazda cx-7 bolts work without having to buy anything else? My issue is that I'm missing 1 of the 14 bolts and that the previous owner used some weird grommets on 2 of the bolts which didn't work and then all of the other bolts have no grommets at all just washers which explains why oil was still leaking after he put new gaskets (some of the bolts were only hand tight)

I'm thinking of ordering the Audi Bolts to get the grommets but then id still have to figure out the 1 missing bolt