So to continue beating the tawdry tale of a broken head stud...(lower #3 to
be precise), I went to visit the mechanic who redid my heads a couple years
back to show him the broken stud as he was very interested in the problem
when it occured last week.  I had a different place repair the van due to
the tow charge and proximity of the break-down.  Anyway, the mechanic was
very surprised to see the break 1/3 from the top of the stud.  In his
experience they usually snap further down the stud and not so high up.  He
also showed me a case of a 2.1 and pointed me to the studs on it.  Every
stud was pitted and rusty and looked pretty bad compared to the stud I
had...which really looked brand spanking new by comparison.  In fact the
stud which broke, is uniformly black and you can feel and see the minute
notches around the diameter of the shaft from when the part was machined -
your thumb nail vibrates if you scratch the stud length wise between both
sets of threads.

Anyway I don't see too many blocks, motors, components, etc,  to know much
about these parts when they fail or what things typically look like.  I do
know now about the condition of which some studs can look like due to
corrosion and overheating.  This one certainly did not look like it was
poorly treated throughout its mechanical life.

BT