Valve Cover Gasket Job Snowballs Out Of Control Help!!!!!!

22lbsofboost

Registered User
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WELL, i needed to fix the blower on this car along with the trans. had a good trans and a spare blower i figured i could do this....pretty cheap. WELL NOW SON that aint the way it ever works is it? so i see oil leaking from the valve covers. well damn that opens up a whole new can of worms. i saw that the heater hoses were a jumbled up work of someone im sure was mildly retarded. im scrapping those for some good year rubber hose, still utilizing the oil cooler. well, i took the brackets and all that crap off the front of the motor, already had the blower, tubes, ic out of the car. i said "damn maybe i oughtta do headgaskets, id be an idiot not to. so tomorrow i will pull the heads off and send them to my head guy for a clean/check and put 4 or 5 angles on my valves. well, now im thinking maybe ill have him just peull them down and let me have them for a week or so so i can hog them out to match the lower i already did some work to.

CASE IN POINT

what is the deal on these mls 4.2 late model gaskets i hear about on here

can i mill a tiny bit off these heads safely?

should i upgrade my stock springs even though im keeping my stock cam

has anyone tried advancing/retarding the stock cam for low end/high end gains?

man this is a HUGE project im taking on. im really wanting to do it right though, so i need some folks

with experience to chime in and tell me what else i might do while i have it torn down this far

i will install a rear main when i get it on the lift to do the tranny

i must also say DAYUM this motor is so clean inside. im really impressed with the way my boy ben kept his oil changed
 
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I think my heads were milled .045" and .05" to get them flat. They were very good. I probably could have just scraped the block smooth and the heads smooth, put new gaskets on and bolted it back up but I wanted to be sure the heads didn't warp.

Anyhow, good luck on the job, its not that bad of a job once you done a few. I can do a head gasket job in a weekend assuming I can get the heads to a machine shop to be milled. Still it's not that I enjoy doing it, but if I have to at least I'm not paying a ford dealer $1500+ for the job.

Hope she runs strong when you bolt it back up. Have you thought of doing a cam and a BHJ balancer while its apart? I'd recommend pulling the water pump and changing the gasket on that too, cuz you never know. I'd hate to bolt it back up and a few months later get a drip.
 
Don't use the 4.2 mls gaskets unless your rebuilding the motor and will be redecking the block. The felpro blue stripe composite gaskets will work fine. BTW, don't forget to replace the headbolts or upgrade to head studs. The existing head bolts are not reusable.

It usually takes between .005 and .010 to clean up the deck on the heads, which will be fine.



David
 
Kevin Varnes said:
Lots of stuff out of the way to put in new engine mounts if you haven't already :)

.
rofl my friend you have no idea
i took the heads off today and dropped off at rolands machine here in valdosta. good guy, does good work. then i pulled the blown aod to stick mine in and saw that trans mount was shot. then i inspect the motor mountes to find then both broken.

SO i pulled the motor today. thing looks great inside. no ridge, plenty of crosshatch in the cylinders, no sludge or any of that crap.

ill pressure wash the engine bay, conceal some wires, reloom all my harnesses, just clean and paint everything and reassemble. its so tempting to ring &bearing it while i have it out but im already in the hole so.......



REMEMBER NOW

this was a valve cover job 3 days ago :rofl
 
22lbsofboost said:
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rofl my friend you have no idea
i took the heads off today and dropped off at rolands machine here in valdosta. good guy, does good work. then i pulled the blown aod to stick mine in and saw that trans mount was shot. then i inspect the motor mountes to find then both broken.

SO i pulled the motor today. thing looks great inside. no ridge, plenty of crosshatch in the cylinders, no sludge or any of that crap.

ill pressure wash the engine bay, conceal some wires, reloom all my harnesses, just clean and paint everything and reassemble. its so tempting to ring &bearing it while i have it out but im already in the hole so.......



REMEMBER NOW

this was a valve cover job 3 days ago :rofl

Valdosta, GA? If so, you need to show that off to the boys in Atlanta when you get done!
 
RBH Racing said:
has anyone found or tried steel shim gaskets for these engines?

The 4.2 MLS gaskets mentioned above are steel shims, but they won't work very well if the block isn't decked.

David
 
JStudrawa said:
Valdosta, GA? If so, you need to show that off to the boys in Atlanta when you get done!
well mike puckett has my old red car. that was the car that started this whole crazy SC infatuation that i have. that car was rough as a cob, and i worked my young ~~~ off at 17-18 years old to fix and drive that car. after 2 motors and 7, thats right, seven aod's, i just gave up on it. but ive had a little time to cool off, and gain some more much needed patience and knowledge for these cars. im right on the ga/fla line, and i will be running here at cecil (south ga motorsports park) since its like 5 minutes from me. since this is the new badass dragstrip im sure you guys will be frequenting this strip soon

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Not sure if this is a good idea, but I put liquid thread sealer on the Valve Cover bolts to keep them from backing off like the olds ones did. I was having oil leak down the heads onto the hot exhaust manifolds and the smoke roll into my heater vent intake. Peeeeauu
It was the same Thread Sealer used on the few intake manifold bolts that go into the water jacket areas..
 
i dont see where it could hurt. that or maybe some weak loctite. not sure if thats the blue or the red but im gonna figure out some way to make them hold. i bought some lockwashers for those bolts too. im currently trying to figure out what to do with these nasty, bubbled up, crappy plastic valve covers. they are fugly. im taking them to the head guy to be tanked. if they survive, cool. if they dont, i guess ill have to figure something else out:D
 
22lbsofboost said:
i dont see where it could hurt. that or maybe some weak loctite. not sure if thats the blue or the red but im gonna figure out some way to make them hold. i bought some lockwashers for those bolts too. im currently trying to figure out what to do with these nasty, bubbled up, crappy plastic valve covers. they are fugly. im taking them to the head guy to be tanked. if they survive, cool. if they dont, i guess ill have to figure something else out:D
I thought of Loctite too, but with them going into Aluminum heads, I re-thought that idea. Not sure if Loctitie would ruin them.

The valve covers are Magnesium, not plastic ;)
 
22lbsofboost said:
i dont see where it could hurt. that or maybe some weak loctite. not sure if thats the blue or the red but im gonna figure out some way to make them hold. i bought some lockwashers for those bolts too. im currently trying to figure out what to do with these nasty, bubbled up, crappy plastic valve covers. they are fugly. im taking them to the head guy to be tanked. if they survive, cool. if they dont, i guess ill have to figure something else out:D

I've always used the blue loctite on all my bolts when rebuilding the top end, so no worries there.

Also the valve covers are either stamped steel or aluminium depending on the year....the plastic looking crap is just the paint.

-Tim
 
dude this is good news. they have to be aluminum because a magnet wont stick to them. so ill have them tanked and then polish my little heart out.
 
just browsing around wondering how the build was going. What are you doing with the heads? Rebuilding, or just machining?
 
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