Thanks brah.

 

This site has TONS of misinformation floating around. The worst part about that is the much of this misinformation is passed on repeatedly to others- who in turn passes it on again.

J

 

Not my fault dude.

 

i'm still no expert by any means but from what i've gathered on this forum and the other 3 i post on in the last 2 years is that head gaskets blow and lead so badly on this engine becaust the head bolts were not tightened tight enough from the factory. now NO i would not recomend just taking off the valve cover and cranking the stock head bolts down another 90-180degrees when they have over 100k miles on them but for a measily 23 bucks at an auto parts store... id say it's worth the buy to keep yourself from a potential head gasket blow. if you do get new bolts and put them in and put them to manual specs don't forget at apx 100-150 miles to pull the valve cover back off to retighten them back down to the same specs.

 

Putting moreclamping forceon an alreadybadly damaged head gasket is basically a short term band-aid. Since you've done so many of them- you could see how f'd up they areonce you take the head off. How many of them do you think would hold by simply applying more torque?Very few if any and ifit could, for how long?
Ever since 1995- Chrysler introduced 2revised head gaskets before they finally got it right with the MLS. The dealership i worked for shared the same building as a Dodge dealership and the Neon's(with the same engine) were leaking just as often.All the Dodge techs first attempted to add more torque as a means of prevention- but that didn't work in the long run. I've done a few "torque" jobs for customers whom couldn't afford a full headgasket replacement to whichmost were unsuccessful in even slowing the leak.

J

 

Ok, here's another gasket question. I have a 99 Eclipse GS with the regular 2.0, 4 cyl DOHC. I noticed some oil on the floor in the garage so Idid some investigating tonight. I checked the oil and it was low (below the min. mark) so I added a quart. I had oil basically ponding on the top of my valve cover around the spark plug wires. So Ipopped the rubber plugs outof each port to take a look. The spark plug port on the passenger side is full of oil, covering thespark plug.One in the middle looks like it's just starting to leak, the next one was fine and thefar driver's side one looks like it's just starting to leak but not bad. The other 3 had no oil sitting in them. I haven't changed the oil since October because I haven't had todrive it much but I had to add a quart tonight. It is getting close to needing an oil change though.The car has 83,000 on it. I ran it for a while to see if I could see any oil coming up but I didn't see any so I suspect it may leak out the top of that port at high speeds or something? I don't know. I'm not a mechanic. I just occasionally work on my vehicles and do what I can.

Anyway, my question is how hard would it be for a novice,to change out the valve cover gasket on this engine? Also, what does the gasket look like? I assume it's fairly large and goes around the spark plug ports? Also, where's a good place to buya good one?

While I've hopefully got somebody here that knows what they're doing, I hope you don't mind if I sneak in one more off topic, stupid question. My car has a fog light out. I feel like a dope, and I have no idea how to change out the bulbs in the fog lights. It's almost like you have to reach up, around and back around the front fender. I took a bolt out but other than that, I wasn't able to do anything. The car was used and didn't come with the user's manual.
Thanks in advance.

 

You should start up a new thread rather than bringing back one that isn't related to your question. You'll get more answers that way. BUT- since you asked. Before i left Mitsubishi motors, a new revised spark plug tube seal was just released and should remedy your problem. Before the new seals were released, replacing the valve cover gasket and tube seals would pretty much be a temporary fix and the new tube seals would eventually leak again. I'm not sure how much better the newer seals are, but that's basically what you have to replace to do the job. Note that if your ignition wires are completely oil soaked, you may need to replace them as well as the plugs.

J

 

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First off, the user's manual is NOT going to show you how to change bulbs OR the gasket. Get a book and do some reading on engine operations. Start learning what makes an engine tick and what the different parts are and do. As much as I hate the Haynes manuals, they have alot of good info for a beginner and are a great place to start learning a bit about the parts. Otherwise they are all the same, say the same things, and go through the same proceedures. A valve cover gasket and the plug tube seals aren't incredibly hard to change (Depending how old and baked onto the cover they are) but you DO need to know what you are doing before playing around with it all. Also change the spark plugs and wires and when you do that, number the plugs on the coil pack so you know which plug wire came from where.