How do you replace a head gasket?

[paul]

you might need the head skimmed

this will defenately need taking into a place with a mill or surface grinder

can i suggest that there is a method to skimming yourself but does take some skill


get yourself some engineers blue , ( its a dark blue dye/runny paste)

and apply using a rag to the engine head , not too thick though just a thin covered layer

then usign an true must stress a "true" flat , (an engineeers flat)

run it as parralell as possible over the head , this will take off the high spots exposing them as clear metal , now get your self an old file, or a new one does not really matter, you can do the head part on a surface plate if you can find one!, using a figure of eight motion.

now grind a radius and a clearance angle on the edge (have a look at the attached pics for examples i have done)

one this is done is it as a scraper ( this method is actually called scraping)

and lightly remove all the high spots, once one layer of metal has been
scraped ,clean up with a rag.

then apply another layer of blue and repeat the whole process untill there is hardly any high spots or none

i have found that this method you can get a high level of accuracy

managed to get a large plate to within .006 microns flattness

hope this will save you taking it into a garage, workshop to get skimmed

thats if it needs it done that is!

hope this helps don't know if anyone has used this method before (being an engineer it comes naturally lol)