My machine shop guys says felpro kit I bought is junk. he claims they dont seal well with aluminum parts. have any of you ever heard this before?

 

If your having them assemble it you should probably use what they are able to work with, I don't know why they have issues with that brand though, but I would want a little more explanation then those are junk, because what could be junk is the care they take in assembling your engine, and they are looking for a prebuilt excuse.

 

Fel-Pro makes some pretty good gaskets. I havent heard of many people having problems with them. There are other brands you could use like Mr. Gasket, just dont get the cheap stuff from a local parts store.

 

He said felpro is a very hard gasket is all and doesn't promote good sealing when aluminum is involved.

 

NASCAR uses felpro. They hold up well.

You have to torque three times.

1. torque all bolts
2. take a coffee break, come back and torque
3. drive the car and get up to temp
4. cool down and torque again this being the third and last time.

They will hold fine using this method. maybe your guy isn't aware of this system.

 

On what aluminum parts? The head gaskets or intake gaskets?

Regardless, I've never had a problem with the Fel-Pro stuff. Lc1vette is making about 950 RWHP in his turbo 1996 vette with a stock replacement Fel-pro head gasket.

In all honesty, I doubt there is much difference either way. If your guy doesn't like the FP gaskets, get something he does like.

 

Aparantly your not aware that most gaskets (that "most" included ALL SBC's) haven't required gasket re-torque in over 30yrs.

Victor Reinz, SCE and Corteco specifically state NOT to do it anymore. Heck I rember seeing that "WARNING" paperwork in a McCord gasket set about 15yrs ago and wondered why they even bothered to waste the print. All you are doing is increasing the chance of pulling the bolts past yeild - at which point your really going to have some problems...

-jeffp1167

Fel Pro does makes a good gasket these days. That said, there was a time in the 1980's a lot of race car engine builders were having problems with Fel Pro head gaskets turning loose on alum head, steel block motors during the cool down cycle. Some engine builders still have hard feelings toward Fel Pro (I'm one of them but I'm getting past it). In the end it really wasn't the fault of the gasket anyway, it was our fault for not using the correct surface finish. Of course no one knew much about that stuff back then and everyone was still using wet grinders or tool steel bits in broaches to surface heads and blocks....

At any rate if your guy wants to use something else my advice is to let him. Victor, SCE and Corteco all make very good gaskets.
Will

 

I have FelPro head and exhaust gaskets. They have been in a couple of years now and they still look like new. No problems with sealing. I am in the engine right now for a cam swap. I'm using all Felpro this time around also. I have been told that GM gaskets are junk by GM service techs. That was after my factory head gasket failed. Put a stock gasket next to a Felpro and you can easily see the difference.

 

I spoke to a Felpro engineer on the phone and was discussing which gasket to use for my LT1 when he told me the part number and this gasket has to have the three torque system. I wish I had his name so you could verify with him. i am just repeating what he told me.

 

I'm just curious I see the second torque step being easy. But how do they expect you to do the third step after it's all together. That just seems kind of rediculous to me taking the exhaust manifolds off again as well as other engine parts to get the valve covers off. Or do you just run it without the manifolds on the car? Because there is no way when the manifolds are on that you are going to be able to tighten the lower side head bolts.

 

Couple months back, I asked TPIS about their .029" (V.R.) head gasket. A local mechanic cautioned against my using a thinner-than-stock head gasket (though not the point here).

Their response was not to worry. Simply, install and torque in sequence. Then, release and re-torque one-by-one! Claimed no problems if this procedure were followed. And, that this technique has been used by them for years.....

Kinda fits between the 1 and 3-step torque recommendations listed here!

 

I think you mis took what he said... or Fel Pro's tech support is about as good as most other aftermarket companies and you talked to some moron who didn't know a gasket from Gidget.

I think what he tried to tell you was to TQ head gaskets in sequence using 3 even steps.

For a SBC (which the heads TQ@65lbs).

First TQ all bolts in sequence at 25lbs.
Second TQ all bolts in sequence to 45lbs.
Third TQ all bolts in sequence to 65lbs.

-Gregg

That method is an add on to the steps I listed above. It's been utilized by engine builders for a very long time on bolts we can't measure streach on such as head bolts or studs. After all the head bolts are TQ to 65lbs you would indeed go back over them one at a time, back it off and re pull it to 65lbs.

If you ever do this you will notice that the bolt will move quite a bit farther than you backed it off (hence you are streaching the bolt farther)... This is because a TQ wrench really only measures the friction a bolt is subject to. When doing this you isolate one bolt at a time and you get less friction on the bolt, since all the other bolts are still TQ'd down holding the gasket compressed.... You need to be careful doing this becasue you can still pull a bolt past yeild or pull the threads out of the block.
Will

 

This begs a question I've had before...

I've heard that the "torque-to-yield" head bolts in my '89 are re-usable. From an ideal standpoint, I wouldn't pick this as my first choice. OTOH, if replacements are $75ish, reusing them is a way to reduce the already rediculous price tag on a "rebuild".

How many times can these bolts be reused? Is there a rating/limit (past which) they can be over-stretched/damaged?

Does every head (kind of) bolt stretch? By this, I mean w/o being able to "recoil" for reuse. I could see the issue of how a bolt recovers applying to this loosening/retorquing discussion.

If you shouldn't reuse a bolt...say more than once (e.g., using it twice). Wouldn't it be considered unreusable after an installation where it was installed, loosened, and re-torqued?

What's the OP doing? IOW, what's his mechanic doing? Could that mechanic's issue with FelPro be traced back to installation issues and/or the reuse of head bolts in rebuilds?

On one hand, there's ton's of positive feedback for FelPro. On the other, I'm thinking the 1010 gasket is the only model of any brand where "issues" have been repeatedly reported.

 

I have never had a problem with felpro head gaskets other than they are thicker than stock. However, that is not the case with their intake gaskets. They are too hard and don't seal well. You have to use a bunch of rtv or they will leak oil and vacuum. That is why they can be reused time & time again. I now use the mr gasket ultras for all of my intake work. They are much softer and form to the intake surface.
No leaks!

John

 

No "TQ to Yield" bolt should ever be re used. Once you strech a bolt past its elasticity point it's junk and you should never re use it.

Problem with the L98 and LTX's is how do you know if its still good or not? Fact is you can never know because the factory didn't write down the lenght of the bolt when they assembled the engine the first time... so you have nothing to correlate the bolts length to when you remove it.

Some are easy -Just look at the TQ spec on those little import cars where you tq the bolts to 30lbs then turn the 90* and the go back and turn them another 45*.... those bolts are junk after that guarenteed. But not so easy to tell with a SBC where you only TQ them to 65lbs....

Best bet is indeed to just buy new bolts.

All bolts strech when tightend down. A certian TQ reading is so posed to strech a bolt a specified amount. But it don't work that way because too many things affect what a TQ wrench reads (which is actually friction against the bolt). Different lubricant, rust in the threads, burnished bolt threads, ect, ect, ect....

I bet alot of Fel Pro head gasket failure on L98's could be traced back to re using the factory head bolts. Some undoubtly could also be traced back to some old timer still using the wrong bits in his broach to re surface heads or a combnation of the 2.
Will

 

I decided to test my fuzzy memory.

I knew I'd participated in a thread which concluded that re-using L98 head bolts was fine. (Problem is, I couldn't remember if it's because they were or were NOT TTY bolts!)

Doing a search, I found the thread here.

If you review the thread, you'll see Pete K appeared to "win" the argument that's it's O.K. to re-use (L98) head bolts. The point was conceeded and never rebutted. Because of the thread, I'd decided re-using head bolts was not a problem. Unless rebutted here, it's because L98s did not use TTY bolts!

If bolts are replaced, Pete K went on to say the threads needed to be "rolled" by tightening/loosening ~3 times. I assume this means wearing the threads enough so less friction is encountered upon torquing. The result would achieve a higher clamp-load (with less friction going to the torque reading.) This might account for the 3-step procedure sited by FelPro.

Another link on the this website claims that improper torque procedures may be responsible for Felpro being blamed for having excessive problems with "1000" series head gaskets.

 

Hmmmm.... The most common Felpro head gaskets used (that I've seen here) are .039" or .041" thick. I don't know about an LT1, but an L98 uses a .051" thick head gasket!

How's that thicker than stock?

 

Can't discuss the best head out of propriety, but the best intake gaskets are Fel-Pro in my opinion. I've used them on every engine I've worked on since 1979 and haven't yet had a dis-appointment.

 

Felp-Pro is the only gasket I've used on all the cars that I have worked on over the years for head gaskets, oil pans, intakes, valve covers, timing covers, ect, ect. I've never had a problem.

I currently have Fel-Pro sandwiched between my head/block, head/intake, oil pan, runners, etc since my last teardown. Not a single leak in years.