[Fot] Best head gasket revisited

[Jerry Van Vlack]

Joe, my experience is only with a hot street engine but worth expressing. 87mm pistons and liners, .090 milled from head and Kastner D cam.
I ran a stock AE330 for almost 40 years with no issues then I did a valve job and hardened EX seats because of recession in #4 EX valve seat. The shop took another approx. .010 off the head (so now approx. .100 off the head) . I used the Cometic 91mm gasket and it burned through at #4 in 2 years of street driving. Maybe 15,000 miles.
The engine was tired by this time having been rebuilt in the 80’s. I rebuilt the engine and decided to use another AE330 with a new head at .070 milled. That gasket leaked because of my dumb mistake not re-torqueing after a few heat cycles. Replaced with another AE330 and now have approx. 10,000 miles with no issues. I did re-torque a couple of times.

Original AE330 copper gaskets are getting hard to find but occasionally show up on EBay, I just bought one. The “new” repro AE 330 copper gaskets are not the same especially in the valve pocket area, I’ve compared them.

My point in al of this is take a look at how an original AE330 fits to your head and block and give it consideration, you might find it acceptable. Or continue to use the steel with thin copper wire that you’ve used. I am not a fan of the Cometic but admittedly mine was used on a street engine with no plans to change it every year. Tony’s experience is worthy of attention, he hammers that engine pretty hard.

JVV

From: Joe Boruch via Fot 
Sent: Saturday, October 24, 2020 9:25 PM
To: FOT List 
Subject: [Fot] Best head gasket revisited

I was not receiving list emails for a while, so I missed the conversation a few months ago. 

For those of you using the composite or even Cometic gaskets, have you done much relieving around the intake valves?  I have not found any such gasket that would not protrude out into the combustion chamber.  I even bought one from BPNW that was good for up to 92mm bore, but it still protruded.  I have been using steel shim head gaskets with copper wire o-rings in the fire rings, but would like a simpler set up.  I have held off on putting my TR3 engine back together for years (while playing with S2000s and Miatas) waiting for a better head gasket.  Joe B


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