Well, it's nothing you all haven't seen before, but here's some pics of my recent BHG...came as a complete surprise since the previous owner said he put in a metal head gasket, and I have only been boosting about 9psi since I got the car. You can see the obvious problem with the head gasket, and that it's definitely not metal...it may even be the original Toyota, the car only has about 100k on it.
So because of money restrictions I am just going to put on a Toyota HG with ARP bolts (and copper spray). That means I won't be doing any sort of rebuild either, unfortunately, but I plan on flushing out the oil several times and hoping it lasts until I can do a rebuild - I think I caught this fairly early on. My head and block seem to be relatively unwarped (within TSRM spec), but I don't have a "precision" straight edge only a relatively cheap one so I'm not entirely sure.
Anyway, I would like to at least take the head to a machine shop and have it machined flat...looks like it would cost about the same as buying one of those machinist's straight edges anyway. Has anyone had any experience with a machinist in the Denver, CO area (or somewhere else in the state) that they would recommend? I would also welcome any other input...for instance, am I making too big of a deal out of this, since I'm only using a stock gasket. Thanks!
-Ben
So because of money restrictions I am just going to put on a Toyota HG with ARP bolts (and copper spray). That means I won't be doing any sort of rebuild either, unfortunately, but I plan on flushing out the oil several times and hoping it lasts until I can do a rebuild - I think I caught this fairly early on. My head and block seem to be relatively unwarped (within TSRM spec), but I don't have a "precision" straight edge only a relatively cheap one so I'm not entirely sure.
Anyway, I would like to at least take the head to a machine shop and have it machined flat...looks like it would cost about the same as buying one of those machinist's straight edges anyway. Has anyone had any experience with a machinist in the Denver, CO area (or somewhere else in the state) that they would recommend? I would also welcome any other input...for instance, am I making too big of a deal out of this, since I'm only using a stock gasket. Thanks!
-Ben