I have a 572 World 4.50 bore aluminum Hemi with Edelbrock Victor heads and Cometic head gaskets that has a coolant leak into the valley after 2 summers of street/strip use.Tried retorqueing the head studs and it got worse.When I removed the heads the gaskets had coolant between the layers. I called Barton and he said he has seen the sleeves "settle"in aluminum blocks and allow coolant to weep up from the lower steam holes around the fire ring and down the exhaust pushrod reliefs.I measured the sleeves and they are 0.0005-0.001 below the deck. I was thinking of trying the Felpro 1104 or Edelbrock gaskets but i noticed in the picture they don't have the 2 steam holes in the outer corners.Has anyone had success using the Felpro"s
I had a coolant leak on my World aluminum block as well , when using the Cometic gaskets. I found out that the World block with the three coolant holes on the bottom uses a different Cometic gasket. I switched to the correct Cometic gaskets and ended the problem. Does your block have the three holes on the bottom ? Also a smear of Hylomar around the coolant passages was applied. You can see in the picture where the standard coolant holes in the original gasket were below the bores . those are not present on the new gaskets. Also has better coverage at the main coolant passages IIRC.
The part # is H2807SP3051S for gaskets that are .051 thick and have the three large coolant holes across the bottom.
The last 3 digits determine the thickness, so 040S would be .040 thick.
Mark
