i have been looking at maby trying a copper headgasket on my car i have been having boost leaks caused by my shitty machine shop o-rings i have tryied everything from re-installing the o-rings,useing different wire,ect.car is only on 30lbs max boost in 4th making 800hp would like to keep this block a little longer so mainly looking for any suggestions besides get anew block.i found these milodon gaskets that alot of different types of racers use and able to push 50lbs of pressure on these with no o-rings.and they are cheap as ****..here is the link= http://www.milodon.com/index.asp

 

That's interesting. I'm curious about this too. I'm about to pull my D head anyway.

 

I have always been told, if you use a copper head gasket, you use a steel o-ring in the block. If you use a steel HG, you use a copper o-ring.

I'm not sure the advantage of one over the other, but there are plenty of people running blocks at those boost pressures without fancy or different stuff. If something is wrong, dont bandaid fix it is my advice.

 

I've found this to be true.
But also, On my roommates car he was told to use stainless rings with a 20$ copper gasket. We used 3 different gaskets and they just wouldn't seal up right. Coolant would leak out, oil leaked and wouldn't hold 20psi of boost.
We switched back to a oem style stainless gasket, with copper rings and these problems went away.
I'd say try to get an idea how big the grooves are cut for the rings, and make sure the wire size is correct in relation to the groove it will sit in.
My next point is- if the machine shop messed up the o-ring install, maybe other things like deck surface of block and head is also incorrect. Just a thought.

 

^^yes the machine shop only cut the orings but the problem was they didnt o-ring each individual cylender the cut in a figure 8 groove around the cylender ..ill post some pics later ..i dont want to bandaid it but i have no other option at this point till i can get the cash together for a new block.as of right now it only leaks alittle between the cylenders .im just trying to look out side the norm to find somthing that might work..

 

^^^
Did you happen to see that milodon recommends rtv to seal the coolant and oil passages? I'm leaning more towards the speed factory trick of decking the block slightly lower than the cylinders and running an oem gasket. That was my original plan till I saw this thread, when I saw how cheap the copper was I started thinking about it. But I'm leaning towards my original plan again.

 

Yea we followed all the recomendations with the rtv around the coolant and oil passages. The pure copper just seemed too soft for this application. It might work great for some but it didn't work for us.
We even used a 40$ fel pro oem style head gasket when trying to nail down the issue, and it still on the car 485ish whp @ 22psi. I suggested against it to the cars owner but he does what he wants, it's funny that it works fine though.

 

lol, thats not a "speed factory trick".. its called stepdecking and its been around FOREVER.

 

I always thought about it, but them doing it is the first I heard of someone actually doing it.

 

im not really looking for the cheapest fix, looking for the somthing that will work and hold boost so i can quit expanding radiators..lol
i have another cometic gasket im going to use for now..

 

my z6 with darton sleeves was stepdecked 7 years ago....and i know it was around alot longer before that even.

 

the first step to fixing your issue is to get rid of the junk cometic gasket and get a oem gasket.

 

I'm not doubting its been done. I have just never heard anyone talk about it but them. Seems like a great simple solution.

 

I use them before they work good with steels Oring wire u have to use some especial cement on the block and the head when ur installing the cooper gasket it's a bit messy

 

If You use a Stainless O-ring Vs. Copper you are suppose too have a reciver groove cut into the head when using a Copper HG.