It is very, very easy to fracture the flexplate to torque converter bolts, I;ve done it. I cannot imagine anything else that could shear them off except maybe and starter locking up when the engine was running, in which case the teeth on both flexplate and starter would probably be screwed up.

Please use new flex plate bolts. They are stretch bolts, and cheap enough. No need to repleat this pleasant experience with the flex plate!

Tighten the bolts in a star pattern to the torque spec, then repeat the pattern with the rotation spec. I don't believe there is a key, and on a flex plate it may not matter. The conveter isn't balanaced to the engine, so just put them on.

Starting with the 123/126 chassis, the crank, balancer, and flywheel were balanced separately, before that as a unit. I don't know about the 116 chassis.

I would check with someone in the transmission business about the tranny before I started the engine just in case -- there might be something to shear the bolts off. Check to see if they look pulled apart or ripped -- there should be some distortion on both parts of the bolt if they acually sheared off.

Peter

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1972 220D ?? miles
1988 300E 200,012
1987 300D Turbo killed 9/25/07, 275,000 miles
1985 Volvo 740 GLE Turobodiesel 218,000
1972 280 SE 4.5 165, 000 - It runs!