Found out the hard way earlier this morning while fixing the DS breather cover. Wrung the top off of one of the aluminum Torx socket head cap screws during final tightening. Lucky the material was aluminum. It was simple to extract the screw with an "easy-out". These really have to be only snug tight. I'd recommend nothing more than 1/8 turn after snug.

Anyway, went to local M-B dealer for replacement screws. Absolutely no help. Got the impression he didn't want to assist me once I said the screw came off a Crossfire with their 3.2L engine in it. Screw them!

Went to Chrysler dealer down the road a piece. Parts guy was helpful and found the screw I was looking for during his search. Printed me a copy of the attached. Unfortunately, didn't have these screws so I special ordered them out of Gainsville, GA warehouse. He told me I should have them within 3-4 days. $4 each. OUCH! $20 to replace all 5.

Since I didn't want the XFire to be out of service for a single M5-.80x16 cap screw, I went to Lowe's and looked in the metric fastener section in hardware. Low & behold I found M5-.80x16 regular SHCS's for $0.80 each. $4 to replace all 5 on the 3.2L! But if you do this, take extra precaution. The normal SHCS's are Grade 12.9 steel and the valve covers are cast aluminum alloy. So it's easy to strip out threads if you over-tighten. Let the Permatex Gasket Maker compound do the work.

I'll start up the XFire later today & look for any catastrophic leaks. Hopefully, I won't find any. Then it will be only necessary to inspect the valve covers after driving around town the next couple of weeks to make sure that the ongoing leak is eliminated. Gotta have this resolved before Dragon weekend.

Later,