Technical How do you find an exhaust leak.....

I'm going to pull the heads this weekend. I gave up on trying to get the bolts out with the heads in place.

 

a little trick we used on big trucks , while hot first center punch the bolt head to shock and break any corrosion welding in the threads then while the manifold is hot take a chunk of crystaline beeswax ( the canning wax bar or a long burn candle is made from it ) and apply it to the bolt heads and let it melt in ( you might have to keep warming up the car or hit the head with a torch) , do that to the bolt heads to get lube under them , then take the wrench and tighten them a smidge ( just a little turn 1/16 or 32 is all it takes ) , it stretches the threads of the bolts so the grip is loosened , and then loosen it ( do this while its warm and right after tightening it , as when it cold the bolt shrinks and tightens its grip ) , you have to pitch the bolts afterwords as they will not hold torque again as there threads are stretched , but you should anyways as the old bolt is probably bottlenecked from rust .

 

Can't get the torch to the head of the bolts without burning stuff. That 455 is wide. I have lots of room fore and aft. Not much side to side. That's why I'm just going to pull the top end.