Thread: New Cylinder Head

Originally Posted by Fausto79

Sorry try again.

There's bits of old gasket which are real hard to get off. Stanley blade out of the question? Or gasket remover?

This was the pic, hopefully. Worked well on the corrosion on the hose adaptor for thermo housing

Using motortech carby cleaner

you can use one of those on the block, I dont reccomend it for the head.

you can use a stanly blade on the block but not the head, you can use a hard plastic scraper on the head (a piece of plastic coke bottle held in a scraper handle usually works well enough and you can use liquig gasket stripper on the head.

Originally Posted by Fausto79

Should i have kept the lash caps in order? Didn't realise and just took them off. Kept the push rods in the right order though. The lash caps i have are in really good order. Don't look like the ones that people say are made of plasticine, i think these are good, I'd like to keep them.

Order of the lash caps doesnt really matter, in a perfectionist world it makes a slight difference but as they generally struggle to make it to 50 K Km dont worry about the lash caps.

Originally Posted by Fausto79

got all new studs for exhaust and inlet and also new nuts.

the supplier i got them from sent me nylon nuts. i think they are d2 ones. i would have thought for such a hot area, nylon would just go to s..t

should i ditch them and get metal ones?

they will still work as a normal nut but wont have the same lock quality, you can get brass manifold pinch nuts that are fantastic.

IF you go steel on steel use some copper coat on the studs.

been hand scrubbing it all weekend coz i wasnt sure if that die grinder attachment would be any good. my hands and my stomach (from leaning over edge of engine bay) are destroyed. plus all the other jobs my wife has had me doing (digging up retic, planting, cleaning gutters). i can barely feel my body. the block is looking pretty sweet though. gona finish it off tonight. the head doesnt need much work as it is brand new. ill just check is and light scrub with one of those yellow sponges you showed me and carby/brake cleaner it.

fitted new core plug under p gasket housing, fitted new oil thermostat and oring, put vdo oil sender unit in tpiece with old unit too. polished exhaust manifold and inlet manifold and fitted the thermo housing with my old elbow pipe to head already so it has plenty of curing time. when i finish cleaning block tonight and head i will be able to be ready to fit head on tomoro and put bits back together. MR is sending me a few bits they should be here today or tomorrow but nothing which is going to stop me putting it back. just stop me from strarting it.

one thing with the vdo pressure sender in the oil filter housing. seems like a fair bit of weight for a 10mm fitting alloy to handle. does it look ok to you guys? with vibrations etc im scared it will stress the housing too much. might do a support bracket.

Originally Posted by Blknight.aus

you can get brass manifold pinch nuts that are fantastic..

They are the oblique looking ones..yes? Or no. I dont recall seeing them in brass.

Originally Posted by Fausto79

been hand scrubbing it all weekend coz i wasnt sure if that die grinder attachment would be any good. my hands and my stomach (from leaning over edge of engine bay) are destroyed. plus all the other jobs my wife has had me doing (digging up retic, planting, cleaning gutters). i can barely feel my body. the block is looking pretty sweet though. gona finish it off tonight. the head doesnt need much work as it is brand new. ill just check is and light scrub with one of those yellow sponges you showed me and carby/brake cleaner it.

fitted new core plug under p gasket housing, fitted new oil thermostat and oring, put vdo oil sender unit in tpiece with old unit too. polished exhaust manifold and inlet manifold and fitted the thermo housing with my old elbow pipe to head already so it has plenty of curing time. when i finish cleaning block tonight and head i will be able to be ready to fit head on tomoro and put bits back together. MR is sending me a few bits they should be here today or tomorrow but nothing which is going to stop me putting it back. just stop me from strarting it.

one thing with the vdo pressure sender in the oil filter housing. seems like a fair bit of weight for a 10mm fitting alloy to handle. does it look ok to you guys? with vibrations etc im scared it will stress the housing too much. might do a support bracket.

Good drills on the clean up work.

yeah, the VDO sender setup is always a little scary, there are other options like remote piping and mounting the senders. or using smaller profile senders.

Originally Posted by theNEWT

They are the oblique looking ones..yes? Or no. I dont recall seeing them in brass.

Did your block come up dead level? Congrats if it did...mine didnt. Prepping the block is a beeearch!!!!

I havent seen one come in under a thou yet.

on average I wind up with 2-3 thou and if its not right between 2+3 then usually its around the gallery for the coolant in the same spot.

Ive had one block with a rise in it.

Ive had some very interesting head warpage on engines Ive pulled down. one was so badly gone I measured it with a pair of rulers. as in put a ruler on the 2 peaks of the bend and then measured the distance down with another ruler. nearly 4mm of deflection from memory.

4mm.....LOL Not much.

I assume as the engine gets hotter the centre of the engine has the greatest concentration of energy as it is the furthest from the outside where energy can be released and therefore the greatest distortion is central....so I understand the block and head pull away from each other against the strength of the head bolts....meaning the centre will have the greatest distortion. Does that make sense?

it does, but your overthinking it.

most things will naturally bend nearest to the middle when subject to thermal abuse.

I also believe that a lot of people shortcut the initial preload torquing of the headbolts by doing the bolts in pattern but then not rechecking all of the bolts to make sure they are all at the right preload prior to winding on the +60+60+20 which means that typicall the center 2 bolts are the loosest at the end of the torquing procedure.


TDI's in my experience normally only let go near the middle of the head or they blow out the back of the head gasket behind #4 especially on discos which I have always attributed to people remembering to preinstall the head bolts at the back of the engine but not to prelube those headbolts prior to installing them combined with its a little harder to get access to them for the torquing procedure.