hey guys,
well because of not having a ton of money to throw around on my car over summer i havent worked on it in a while. heres how the story goes: started out with the cometic head gasket with the turbo build last summer, well started leakin on me after running 15 psi for a few weeks while we were tuning the AEM. so, ordered another one and had the head and block resurfaced becuase i know you have to watch the finishing when using the cometic. yeas and the tightening sequence with the ARP head studs was done right every time the engine was put back together. had the second cometic on when the car hit the dyno early this summer in detroit. it was a mustange dyno, man were these rollers big, it was working the cavy harder than its ever had to work. keep in mind this dyno is used in a shop where it used mostly for nothing other than boosted small and big block musclecars are done which are usualy making no less than 500 hp. i was a little worried how hard this thing was working the car but anway on with the story. as for the numbers 290 hp and 325 lb ft with a power curve that started to stuble at roughly 6700 rpm "only has secret cam swap, i some bigger ones along with the HO intake", pretty impressive considering what boost pressure we made it to before blowing the second cometic. we made it to about 12 psi according to the map sensor on the AEM when it popped although we did get about three pulls on it at that pressure but sure enough we blew another one. i have talked with a few shops in the pittsburgh area here, a few of them which specialize in turbo built cars and they are telling im not the only one who has had problems with cometic head gaskets. more than one is telling me to go with a copper SCE gasket and oring seal style and ill be good. called SCE today, well they do have one they stock for the 2.3 but not for the 2.4 go figure, why would they. luckily they custom make gaskets for any app. if you need them to and the price is reasonable. they gaurantee it will hold easily up to 30 lbs of boost. they actualy offer an o-ring type setup where they engrave a small ring around the cylinders and insert a .015" steel wire in the groove. this requires no machine work that has to be done to the head or block unlike other o-ring head gaskets. i am to the point where i have no ther option, yes i know other people such as boosted2point4 and such are runnin the cometic with no problems but hey, no engine is the same they are all their own unique piece of engineering and things can happen. anyway, just havent been on here and posted in a while and thought i would let everyone know whats going on. i am hoping to have the car put back together before the end of the month along with the new SCE gasket and cranking up the turbonetics turbo to 20 psi. i will upload a pic of the dyon sheet soon, thanks again
pleeeease use paragraphs...that was lengthy and rather hard to read. However...i did try lol. Sorry to hear about your luck with cometic, i've heard nothin but good stuff...but after twice i think i'd give up too. pics of your setup?
I know the Eco guyys are having issues with the cometic gaskets, alot of the boosted ecos run stock head gasket
I was going say why not try a stock gasket for now and see how that goes.
yeah, cometics ftl....
my stock head gasket was like *yawn* at 18 psi
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I remember a post asking about what head gasket to use and some saying that they had had nothing but problems with the cometic. So when I built my engine I just went with a stock rplacement fel pro arp head studs and of course a staight head and block surface.
FORGET GIRLS GONE WILD WE HAVE GOVERNMENT SPENDING GONE WILD!
doesnt the arp head studs call for re-torquing after a while?
i wouldnt think a lot of ppl would do that as its a major PITA to get to the head bolts on the 2.4.
yeah i thought the same and actualy did throw an OEM head gasket in it to see what it would do, well guess again that one lasted until i got a boost spike up to about 16 psi "was having some issues with the boost controller" so yeah this copper gasket is whats on order. i will let you guys know how it goes. i have some pics of my setup in my profile.....check em out
If you are going through that many HG's do you think you might have a problem elsewhere that needs to be fixed? I mean you're not in uncharted territories and I don't remember anyone having such reoccurring HG problems.
I checked out your profile. You should really try and get some better pics of the eigine bay.
FORGET GIRLS GONE WILD WE HAVE GOVERNMENT SPENDING GONE WILD!
