Never seen one of these fail before

I've seen two things on the internet that interest me about this, one, someone suggested flame annealing the washers as the new ones are too hard, and two, put it together, tighten it up, and then give it an appropriate smack with a hammer, which helps the irregularities in the casting to "form" with the washer, and retighten. of course THAT leads to "work hardening", so.....................