I was sworking *a ton* the peddler the other night. (a ton, pronouced
2000 pounds, is when you overwork yourself while swearing at your car.
:-) (Isn't it amazing how we come up with names for our cars? ;-)
One of the things I did to the peddler was retorque the head. I was
tempted to loosen all the nuts before retightening, but I didn't want
to risk losing the seat the head already had on the gasket. So, I
decided to see if the nuts were loose enough to start from where they
sat. Since they were only torqued down to 55 ft/lbs(!), I felt like I
could easily start from there and work up to 70 without concern. This
was after about 700 miles of driving on a newly rebuilt engine. Since
the head loosened up over 20%, I now know why it is important to
retorque a head on a rebuilt engine. How come new cars don't have
their heads retightened after initial breakin? (Is there any breakin
on new cars anymore?)
Anyway, I have looked at many TR6 engines since rebuilding mine, and
I've noticed that they all (at least the ones I've looked at) leak oil
(on cam side) around the head. My new engine does this too, but only
a small amount. Actually I didn't notice it until I was out on a
bright sunny day, and saw a shiny line right along where the head
meets the block. I ran my finger down the line and got a small trace
of oil on my finger. I'm hoping that retorquing the head will solve
the problem, but from the number of leaky TR6 head gaskets that I've
seen, I doubt it will ever completely go away. I was wondering if
anyone has used a high temp permatex on the outer sealing edge of a
head gasket... I've always heard to *never* put anything on a head
gasket, but the next time I pull a head on a TR6, I'd be tempted to
try a *thin* film of something on the outer edge to try and solve this
problem. Comments? BTW, I used the upper gasket set from TRF.
Scott "I peddle petals while I piddle with the pedals on the peddler." Paisley
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