Merkin

what if the exhaust manifold nut is rusted to **** like what I expected is it safe to torch? would I risk damaging my head?

quattro.pilot

I should think the exh.mani bolts you could give'r with the head pretty good and won't really ruin anything. Just make sure you land most of the flame on the exhaust piping & nut/stud.

Int.mani bolts I'd be a little more wary of, mostly because you can't apply heat anywhere near the threads. You'd have to heatup the entire bolt first, and in the process would probably spill and transfer a lot of it into the head. Have you tried an impact gun on the IM bolts? Sometimes that's a good tool/method. But when all else fails heat is all you got; just apply it carefully and try to only heat as much as you believe necessary to crack the corrosion.

best of luck. don't light anything on fire ;-)

Merkin

because I want space to carefully separate the manifold and downpipe to not snap the studs.

quattro.pilot

<exhaust> at the turbo downpipe and yanked the whole thing out. Figured it'd be easier to deal with rusty nuts on the engine stand. turns out they were hardly stuck at all... spun right off with the impact gun <YAY!>

u can dooIt =)

quattro90S6

yeah, do it at work fairly often