head bolt?

Are the head bolts on a 96 5.9 magnum reuseable?

I wouldn't

Head bolts are torque to yield, you should never reuse TTY bolts.

Can you? Yes, in a pinch. Should you? Absolutely not. Important bolts should never be used even if they aren't specified as TTY. Rule of thumb, if you can't afford for it to fail, replace it.

Torque to yield stretched the bolt beyond what it can recover from. Like a spring, bolts can stretch a certain amount and still return to their original length. When once a bolt yields it passes the point of which it can return to its original length, like stretching a 4 inch travel spring 5 inches, it's permanently deformed and loses a great deal of strength in its normal operating range.

Bolts are TTY in certain applications where high frequency or load is present. Such as a cylinder head having to withstand the high pressure and frequency of small explosions occurring below it.

Think of a chain being used to pull a car out of a ditch. If you remove the slack before pulling you are putting a preload on the chain, then when you hit the gas, the chain experiences a smooth increase in strain and can easily withstand the force. However, if you have slack in the chain then begin pulling, the chain will go from having no force to a lot of force quickly. The chain might withstand this kind of use for a while, but it will fail much more quickly. Simply put that's why bolts are specified TTY.

When I had new heads installed, my then-mechanic said that the old bolts would be fine to reuse. First time the engine was started, the resulting burning coolant from the exhaust filled the entire bay in about 15 seconds. I can't believe that the engine even stayed running.

Don't try to reuse them or you'll be sorry.

OK. Thank you all for the replies. I didn,t want to make a huge mistake for a few $$.