Hello!

I have a 1997 camaro z28 with an LT1, I just changed the head gaskets on this bad boy because I snapped an exhaust manifold bolt in the driver side head. It is important to note that this car did not have ANY problems with the head gaskets before, I would drive it really hard and never had coolant or oil loss or any symptoms of a bad head gasket. I also had solid compression on 7 cylinders, one of them is a little lower but not out of tolerance. I sent the heads to a reputable machine shop and had them deck the gasket surfaces so I would have a nice flat mating surface and have that darn broken bolt removed. The shop said my head was 7 thousandths warped and that it was a wise decision to bring them over. I did not have the block or the heads checked for cracks. I did not see this necessary because like I said, I had no problems that would indicate a need for a check. So after putting it all back together it is leaking coolant into the oil pan quite profusely, and I checked this by draining all the oil out of the engine and doing a pressure test on the radiator. The gauge shows a slow leak in the cooling system and shortly after pressurizing the system coolant starts dripping out of the oil pan. I know this is obviously a head gasket leak because on the LT1 the only way coolant can get into the oil pan is by a crack in the heads or block or the head gasket. So I know what I need to do, but what I want to know is should I bother having the block checked for cracks? It is a lot of work/money to get a block completely bare and then haul it over to a machine shop. Ill have the heads checked for cracks as well. 7 thousandths seems like quite a lot is it possible the block surface is warped as well? One thing I did find kind of funny was one of the head gaskets had a slight crease in it. But I didn't think it was notable enough to cause me problems. Maybe that ignorance costed me all this trouble. I linked the head gasket kit I bought for this project.

Thanks!

Head Gasket kit: https://www.carid.com/fel-pro/fel-pr...-40592704.html

 

Are those Felpro MLS gaskets? Personally I would pull the head and inspect, and then install a GM MLS head gasket and cross fingers.

You sure you torqued the head bolts properly? Did you make certain you cleaned all the head bolt holes really well so you aren't bottoming a bolt out on coolant?

 

I torqued them to the sequence that shbox has which seems to be the same all around. Maybe I didn't clean the bolt holes well enough. Aren't MLS gaskets really picky with surfaces that aren't perfectly flat? I figured I would have to machine the block for that.

 

Very important to clear the head bolt holes in the block of any coolant before installing heads onto the block. If coolant gets trapped inside it could crack the block if you were to run the engine.

 

Personally I haven't had any issue with MLS gaskets sealing, head, exhaust, etc.

As stated above if you didn't get all the coolant out of the bolt holes that could be a big problem, good luck!