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Liquid gasket products - beware.
Dunno what the conventional wisdom (or the products) are in the US - but here in the UK the normal advice I've heard / given / applied - is, when there are no gasket kits available use gasket paper and make up your own..... or at a push some thin card (once tried a Corn Flakes box) from some other source. But gasket paper is dirt cheap and available everywhere, so the breakfast cereal can be saved from too much mutilation.
As for liquid gasket sealant I've always used a thin smear of it too to bond the paper gasket to the metal surfaces.
It sounds like in the US there are "gasket-less" wonder products that just bond the parts together. I've seen a few here too, and of course you need to apply the same or similar to the crank cases if they are split.
What really worries me is the convention for using liquid gaskets alone for most or every surface. You will need more than the 'smear' I would apply to a paper gasket and the build-up of excess solidified / flexible goo in the engine will start to block oilways and could lead to expensive engine rebuild bill.
About 10 years ago when my engine rebuilding skills were next to nothing I entrusted the XS engine (5th gear went AWOL) to a friend. Ran really well for 200miles....then Big End failure. When I pulled it apart the amount of "goo" floating around in the oil and trapped into oilways and any other small space was pretty amazing.
Just some bad experience to stem your gasket applicating fingers a little - be careful with that stuff. If you do use it run the engine for a few miles and then do another oil change to try and minimise what's there. These days I would even go as far as dropping the sump plate to make sure there is not a lot of build up there...waiting to break loose and fill all those important little places up. 'Course, you may need to make another gasket up from the left over gasket paper you now have vast supplies of!!
Once bitten twice shy
Dunno what the conventional wisdom (or the products) are in the US - but here in the UK the normal advice I've heard / given / applied - is, when there are no gasket kits available use gasket paper and make up your own..... or at a push some thin card (once tried a Corn Flakes box) from some other source. But gasket paper is dirt cheap and available everywhere, so the breakfast cereal can be saved from too much mutilation.
As for liquid gasket sealant I've always used a thin smear of it too to bond the paper gasket to the metal surfaces.
It sounds like in the US there are "gasket-less" wonder products that just bond the parts together. I've seen a few here too, and of course you need to apply the same or similar to the crank cases if they are split.
What really worries me is the convention for using liquid gaskets alone for most or every surface. You will need more than the 'smear' I would apply to a paper gasket and the build-up of excess solidified / flexible goo in the engine will start to block oilways and could lead to expensive engine rebuild bill.
About 10 years ago when my engine rebuilding skills were next to nothing I entrusted the XS engine (5th gear went AWOL) to a friend. Ran really well for 200miles....then Big End failure. When I pulled it apart the amount of "goo" floating around in the oil and trapped into oilways and any other small space was pretty amazing.
Just some bad experience to stem your gasket applicating fingers a little - be careful with that stuff. If you do use it run the engine for a few miles and then do another oil change to try and minimise what's there. These days I would even go as far as dropping the sump plate to make sure there is not a lot of build up there...waiting to break loose and fill all those important little places up. 'Course, you may need to make another gasket up from the left over gasket paper you now have vast supplies of!!
Once bitten twice shy
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