Sealing A Head To The Head Adapter - What are you using?

[Dom G]

I just started to flow the first actual cylinder head on my bench which has been pretty interesting. I can see already there is a very long learning and knowledge curve!

One problem I'm having is to be able to seal the appropriate cylinder head chamber to the head adapter quickly and completely.

I've been using a head gasket that matches the head which seems to work fairly well. But when trying to do a cabinet leakage test with the head mounted and the valves closed before performing the actual flow testing, I'm getting a higher % of leakage so I know the head is not sealing well enough.

I ordered a sheet of some fairly dense 1/8" thick neoprene thinking it may make life easier and work better. Won't know for a few days though.

In the meantime, I was just wondering what materials others here are using and having good results?

Thanks.

Dom

[Mousehouse1]

You can try clay or grease to help seal the head to the bench and to the fixture. Is it a new or old head gasket? You can try and find some rubber material that is close to the same thickness that your gasket is.

I use a head gasket or rubber material that I purchased locally to help seal the heads to the bench.

[larrycavan]

On occasion, when a problem like that crops up, I use tool box drawer liner material as a gasket...It's given suprisingly good results...

Larry C

[Dom G]

It sounds like the neoprene might work pretty well.

Thanks.

[Thomas Vaught]

A piece of Neoprene will work just fine.

Tom V.

[Mousehouse1]

Larry I have used that as well. I use it when I am flow testing or calibrating plates.

[gofaster]

On Harleys, I use a head gasket siliconed to the test cylinder, and vaseline on the side of the gasket that the head sits on, vaseline on both sides of the cylinder base gasket, and on the adaptor o-ring.

I start out with new gaskets, and re-use them until they leak.

For V-8 heads, I use vaseline on both sides of the head gasket, and on the o-ring under the slider plate, and on the bottom o-ring