Thank you for another engineering backed video. I'm now subscribed to your channel. I'm so tired of watching videos of people that have no clue what they are talking about, telling others how to "fix" their truck. There is a channel of a young man showing everyone all the great "bolt-on" performance mods for this truck (6.0), yet his truck has a long uneven crank and smokes like a freight train. He was so proud he got his 0-60 time below 11 seconds after spending 4K on tunes and bolt-ons ( the factory road test was 9 seconds 0-60 stock). Sorry for the ramble, just so impressed to see real technical knowledge.
Thank you very much. I try to make these in a teaching/engineering frame. When I was young I grew up on magazine like Hot Rod, when they went into great detail about the things they did. Sort of my target.
First off, thank you very much for making this video. This has helped further affirm the reason behind my head gasket failure. I had my suspicions about about a potential issue caused by the use of a Fel-Pro gasket with O-ringed heads. Having just tested today , that my head gasket is blown EVEN after rebuilding the engine myself, it's confirmed. The head gaskets made it about 8k miles. I had the heads worked by a local trusted machine shop before the rebuild as well as had them O-Ring the heads. The raised O-ring after recessed and installed is .003". I used the Fel-Pro head gaskets with the O-ringed heads. I also head them clean, check, paint and hone the engine block. The machine shop made no recommendations as to what head gaskets to use and I did not ask. So I blame myself. So my assumption here is that the O-rings are in too close proximity to the Fire-rings in the raised area on the Fel-Pro Gaskets. I'm assuming this affected the total sealing area around the combustion chamber of the head to block. Hopefully no damage as done to the heads or block. I'll have it torn down this weekend and report back. I would also like to state I used ARP studs as well. The truck has a mild 40hp tow tune. I also installed a custom auxiliary air to oil cooler to work in conjunction with the stock oil cooler and a fully aluminum radiator. I also made slight modifications to the hood to improve airflow from the grill, bumper and out past the cowl as I live in the high desert and often tow our 8000lb Travel Trailer through hot thin aired Mountain passes. I also installed the snow plow electronic fan clutch an added grounding switch for the fan clutch to engage 100% duty cycle post pulling steep grade. I use the BANKS monitor to keep an eye on temps. This monitor has customizable max temp settings which are set a 230F. I thought that was too high, so I lowered the max oil and engine temp values to 205F. The truck has never gotten over 198F coolant and 190F oil post engine rebuild. Again, thank you for the excellent video!
Thanks for the information I wish there was more people like you on youtube. You make videos worth watching. Your persistence for perfection gave me a new direction. Take care.
I have a 2006 f250. I blew head gaskets twice. Every time it happened I had my tuner to max. I don't turn my tuner all the way up anymore. Daily driver a d heavy towing mode only. I think the head fasteners stretch and boom! U got coolant on your windshield
The four bolts around the head have a clamping force of 4 times the stock combustion pressure. So if you are in the 600hp range, you still have twice the clamping load compared to combustion pressure. That's low compared to engineering standards, but it's still hard to bench press 200lbs if you can only do 100lbs. The bolt spacing is much wider than the standard engineering practice of 4 diameters, and the heads were never designed for additional strength over the larger span they should have been. If you look at the 6.4L heads, which only have a moderate hp increase to the 6.0L, there is more reinforcement across the bolt-to-bolt locations and stiffening ribs extending to the injector to keep the head from deflecting. Heads can deflect dynamically (elastic) until they exceed yield and you have a permanent bow or warp. After that, they still will elastically deflect, but now it's the sum of the yield and dynamic. We see that when the engine will puke under a max tune, but if the person dials down the toon, he can nurse the truck without puking. It's not the fasteners.
Once again another amazing video. I find alot of performance shop defaulting to the o ringed heads, but they also dont do any on site machine work. Shops that do in house machine work seem to stray away from the o ringed heads. I really think i comes down to the head/block mating surface
Thanks again. I know Superduty Service is using the Fel-Pro without O-rings, and I heard it is doing well. In my search, I've also found several forum posts where the people have the same results. I don't think the gaskets themselves are the primary, but maybe contributary, A + B = C. Maybe a small letter a. It really depends on the situation you are in; if you need replacement heads, the O-ringed heads are within reach, you are already deep into it. If I had 18mm heads, myself, I'd be thinking more towards replacement.
@@toomanytoys Yes. Anthony has had great success with the Fel-Pro gaskets! His shop is only 2.5 hours from me. He's done some comparison video on the Ford and Fel-Pro gasket. Not at your level but just in packing and surface quality visible to the naked eye. Your HG video sealed...lol....the deal even more. After my second ford gasket failure I switch. Now, there's a ton of info I can't spend time writing here. But, in short. My second set of HG's I sent back to Ford. Not wrapped or protected between the two gaskets. Just laying in the sealed box rubbing and scratching against each other. Next set loose in the box with a piece of cardboard between the two. I made up my mind then not to to use Ford HG's. Now of course there can be other issues for a HG failure. But a quality HG is a great start! Ford is not providing quality much anymore. The old saying... Planned obsolescence. For the 6.0. It was a rush to get engine out first to claim our diesels burn cleaner. I'm off soapbox now! Great info Jack as always!👍
@@eddylee587 Thanks, Eddy. As I started to say in another video comment section, I had used a back door open to me to talk a little about what they had done two years back. That door is now closed with Tennaco's purchase. The advantage they had was designing the gasket around the failures and service industry. The disadvantage Int/Ford had was designing under the new manufacturing conditions. Int/Ford did update the gasket early on but did not address some of the issues in-field. While I liked the sealing material Ford gaskets have, I think the Fel-Pro is a better solution. It won't cure everything as I think the head design is poor, not so much the bolts. With the first rework that failed and the second that did not, I would ask any change to the head or block surfaces other than the gasket?
@@toomanytoys On my second repair I really paid attention to how I was removing the old gasket material. I can't count how many cans of brake clean I used. Carefully sanding both block and head as I did before. Cleaned out every bolt holes. On reassembly I used ARP's as b4 with their assembly lube. I ran each bolt all the way in and measured bolt length exposed. 2 were different by .0.125. Not sure if it would be something to be concerned about? But, I did thread chase each one afterwards. Used compressed air etc.. Each were within .010-.020. Reassembled and backing out the bolt once I bottomed out a whole turn. Making sure I used lube under each washer and nut, as b4. I spoke with a ARP tech decades ago when I was rebuilding SBF's and started using their products and he made the comment as to not run the bolt all the way in and to back it out half to full turn. Something I've maintained all these years. I guess there's the possibility of the bolt still turning a bit while installing the bolts and torquing??🤔. Made since to me so I follow that process and recommendation. Sorry for the rambling. Thanks for all your great technical information and videos! I wish we could have met. We have the same passion!,👍
@@eddylee587 The issue with the bottoming of a stud is that if it does turn, it adds to the force the threads see, the head side pulling up and the bottoming side pushing up. There is always thread distortion, but you can add more if the stud is bottoming and pushes up to the point of thread failure. With the washers, they should be lubed on one side only, the nut side. There are some motors where ARP suggests a few strokes of rough sandpaper on the head side of the washers to ensure the washers do not rotate but are only a bearing surface to the nut. Doubling the bearing surfaces can alter the force from the torquing. Whenever I get to publishing the assembly video, you'll see where I mark the head, stud, and nut to indicate rotation. That will also help if anyone wants to check if the stud or nut has backed off in service. We're using this ARP super lube, so the static friction to prevent backing off is also lessened.
Ive watch every video (amazing videos, great info) and on the head gasket thickness i pretty much came with very close results as yours and Bpd, however everywhere I look online, felpro claims that their gasket is .041 compressed, but my micrometer doesn’t agree, and OEM claims to be .059, i have used heads down to 3.78 with the felt-pro gaskets without an issue but i always thought they really were .041 or .018 thinner than OEM, im dealing with a head that is 3.720 and i was trying to compensate with a thicker gasket, cometic sells one that is .067. I guess the question is, why are we coming with this results when felpro claims their gasket is .041, did the person you spoke to mention anything about their gasket thickness. THANK YOU!
In my discussion with the Fel-Pro engineer, as we went over this, he stated, "In that case of these gaskets, that is 1.586mm or 0.062". I've never seen Fel-Pro give the dimension in literature, which is why I had the discussion directly. If you could provide the link, it would be helpful.
I found information from Mahle regarding their gasket and after I called them they stated the thickness of their gasket to be 0.059" but they couldn't tell me if that measure was at the fire-ring or at the main gasket, but I found information on the Cometic web site regarding diferent thickness on their HG they provide a 0.053" a 0.062", and a 0.067" option, I'm going on a similar rabbit whole that you went thru and I would like to get your opinion on this they don't offer the 0.053" on the newer 20MM head option, do you know if Ford went away from the 0.053" on the later motors and that's why Mahle has gone to a thicker gasket on thier stuff since they are presumably the suppliers to Ford on the OE gasket, fantastic video by the way, I'm a fan of your work as a mechanical engineer that works in the manufacturing industry just watching your stuff, has helped me ton.
Thanks, Geri. I try to do these in the same vein as my old career. I don't know of anyone who has measured the Mahle gaskets. BPD had a thread on PS.org detailing more than just the two I did, but again, not the Mahle. It's kind of disappointing they could not give a direct answer; I had no problem with FelPro, but it was more of a direct engineering connection. www.powerstroke.org/threads/6-0l-head-gasket-comparison.971506/ But like FelPro, they would want to give a little more height to compensate for the possibility of decking the block with an aftermarket product. My numbers for my 20mm Ford gaskets were in line with the Ford 18mm gaskets that BPD measured, so I don't think Ford upsized the gaskets. While Mahle may be the OE assembly line manufacturer, they would be constrained by the contract to not copy the product to the aftermarket. It may be more than just the coating, but I did not compare again. I guess I'm also responding to you on FTE. Yeah, the 6.0L is a rabbit hole.
I can’t understand how anyone would need the fire ring setup for clamping load. We have studded a lot of f450s and f550s from blow egrs back in the day ,some still going, that tow a mid size excavator or skid steer daily which weight 6-8 tons with a loaded truck and dosnt blow head gaskets. So idk must be good marketing. Thanks for the video.
My undertanding is it's purpose is not clamping in the sense that the fire ring is, concentrating the compression on that ring, but to keep the fire ring from laterally moving, scrubbing the sealant loose..
I am trying to get my already studed 2007 f-250 lariat tow reliable. I have a blown headgasket. The shops i have visited say that they have been seeing the heads lift again when towing heavy. Would you recommend using a stronger stud to avoid lifting of the heads. Such as ARP 250-4205 CUSTOM AGE 625+ HEAD STUD KIT 03-07 6.0L FORD POWERSTROKE?
There are a lot of variables to this. First, I'm not one who believes this is fundamentally a head bolt/stud problem. The clamping force with the stock bolts is about 4x the stock combustion pressure, so if you can only bench lift 100 lbs, it's impossible to lift 400 lbs. If you push higher numbers with a tune, you would still have a good margin. I believe the fundamental issue with this four-bolt-per-cylinder design has two ways of looking at it. It should have had two more bolts per cylinder, or the head should have been designed like the 6.4L with the same bolt pattern, with more reinforcement to keep the head from distorting in the center. If we are reusing heads and not machining them flat, no matter the Ford spec, it leaves for an early failure. But there is very little margin with these heads for machining, and the more you mill off, the weaker the head becomes - it can distort more easily.
With MLS gaskets, I wouldn't use the copper or any other sprays. As long as you are not using a tune, or maybe I should say an aggressive tune, the factory head bolts are fine, IMO. Buy ones from Ford or Navistar, not Fel-Pro or any other aftermarket supplier.
Some o-ringed head suppliers do not support certain head gaskets with their products. It's best to ask the company who supplies the o-ringed heads what they say will or will not work. There is no way for us to know how one supplier's o-rings and gasket fire rings interact. Fel-Pro does not endorse o-ring as they have stated they have not tested all the different placements of o-rings. However, I know of someone who had used non-endorsed gaskets, and he has been fine.
@@toomanytoys thanks for the quick response. About how long have u been running the fel-pro? Since then you've towed any weight for any duration? Once again thanks for the updates cause I just bought a 2005 f250 6.0 with 223k miles and no issues (thank you Jesus!) Other thank leaking radiator, but thinking about going a head and doing ARP or Exotic head bolts with cab on. But the kind of guy that might just do the head gaskets since I'll be all over the top of the motor just by doing the studs. One last thing, any other tips, tricks, pointers for longevity. Might get a tune with a few different ones like economy, tow... etc but other than that just want it to tow when needed and last for 400-500k. Thanks and y'all be safe.👍
@@Mreverything84 The truck has only done local runs with fuel prices. I'm not a fan of tunes, but ZMANN of PS.org pushed with a tune too hard and has a slight leak under high pressure. That has allowed him to try tunes to see which are less prone to bowing the head and getting it to puke. I would not do gaskets and ONLY ARP STUDS when it is needed.
No, they are not. As I used my backchannel into Fel-Pro; they put some thought into what was happening and did a forensic analysis, too. I highly recommend their gaskets including over OE.
Thank you for another engineering backed video. I'm now subscribed to your channel. I'm so tired of watching videos of people that have no clue what they are talking about, telling others how to "fix" their truck. There is a channel of a young man showing everyone all the great "bolt-on" performance mods for this truck (6.0), yet his truck has a long uneven crank and smokes like a freight train. He was so proud he got his 0-60 time below 11 seconds after spending 4K on tunes and bolt-ons ( the factory road test was 9 seconds 0-60 stock). Sorry for the ramble, just so impressed to see real technical knowledge.
Thank you very much. I try to make these in a teaching/engineering frame. When I was young I grew up on magazine like Hot Rod, when they went into great detail about the things they did. Sort of my target.
A wonderful assortment of excellent videos. Kudos.
First off, thank you very much for making this video. This has helped further affirm the reason behind my head gasket failure. I had my suspicions about about a potential issue caused by the use of a Fel-Pro gasket with O-ringed heads. Having just tested today , that my head gasket is blown EVEN after rebuilding the engine myself, it's confirmed. The head gaskets made it about 8k miles.
I had the heads worked by a local trusted machine shop before the rebuild as well as had them O-Ring the heads. The raised O-ring after recessed and installed is .003". I used the Fel-Pro head gaskets with the O-ringed heads. I also head them clean, check, paint and hone the engine block.
The machine shop made no recommendations as to what head gaskets to use and I did not ask. So I blame myself.
So my assumption here is that the O-rings are in too close proximity to the Fire-rings in the raised area on the Fel-Pro Gaskets. I'm assuming this affected the total sealing area around the combustion chamber of the head to block. Hopefully no damage as done to the heads or block. I'll have it torn down this weekend and report back.
I would also like to state I used ARP studs as well. The truck has a mild 40hp tow tune. I also installed a custom auxiliary air to oil cooler to work in conjunction with the stock oil cooler and a fully aluminum radiator. I also made slight modifications to the hood to improve airflow from the grill, bumper and out past the cowl as I live in the high desert and often tow our 8000lb Travel Trailer through hot thin aired Mountain passes. I also installed the snow plow electronic fan clutch an added grounding switch for the fan clutch to engage 100% duty cycle post pulling steep grade. I use the BANKS monitor to keep an eye on temps. This monitor has customizable max temp settings which are set a 230F. I thought that was too high, so I lowered the max oil and engine temp values to 205F. The truck has never gotten over 198F coolant and 190F oil post engine rebuild.
Again, thank you for the excellent video!
Sorry to hear about the issue.
Thanks for the information I wish there was more people like you on youtube. You make videos worth watching. Your persistence for perfection gave me a new direction. Take care.
I appreciate that!
Great video really appreciate professional time and testing you put in along with options. Exceptional work.
I really find your videos very informative. I appreciate you doing them.
I appreciate that!
Another great video. Keep up the great work. Not enough technical information out there and I always love seeing your take on these things.
Lots to consider when you break it down like that. Thanks again for all the great info.
Your welcome.
Love all your videos. I also live in NJ and have a 2004 6.0 that has had a lot of work done to her. We should get together and compare! - Jonathan
If I ever finish this one out.....
I have a 2006 f250. I blew head gaskets twice. Every time it happened I had my tuner to max. I don't turn my tuner all the way up anymore. Daily driver a d heavy towing mode only. I think the head fasteners stretch and boom! U got coolant on your windshield
The four bolts around the head have a clamping force of 4 times the stock combustion pressure. So if you are in the 600hp range, you still have twice the clamping load compared to combustion pressure. That's low compared to engineering standards, but it's still hard to bench press 200lbs if you can only do 100lbs.
The bolt spacing is much wider than the standard engineering practice of 4 diameters, and the heads were never designed for additional strength over the larger span they should have been. If you look at the 6.4L heads, which only have a moderate hp increase to the 6.0L, there is more reinforcement across the bolt-to-bolt locations and stiffening ribs extending to the injector to keep the head from deflecting.
Heads can deflect dynamically (elastic) until they exceed yield and you have a permanent bow or warp. After that, they still will elastically deflect, but now it's the sum of the yield and dynamic. We see that when the engine will puke under a max tune, but if the person dials down the toon, he can nurse the truck without puking.
It's not the fasteners.
Second time in the last couple days that because of your videos I have had to take an aspirin before bed.... 🧐
I take one every night......
@@toomanytoys
I can understand that. Wait, only one? 🧐
Once again another amazing video. I find alot of performance shop defaulting to the o ringed heads, but they also dont do any on site machine work. Shops that do in house machine work seem to stray away from the o ringed heads. I really think i comes down to the head/block mating surface
Thanks again. I know Superduty Service is using the Fel-Pro without O-rings, and I heard it is doing well. In my search, I've also found several forum posts where the people have the same results. I don't think the gaskets themselves are the primary, but maybe contributary, A + B = C. Maybe a small letter a.
It really depends on the situation you are in; if you need replacement heads, the O-ringed heads are within reach, you are already deep into it. If I had 18mm heads, myself, I'd be thinking more towards replacement.
@@toomanytoys Yes. Anthony has had great success with the Fel-Pro gaskets! His shop is only 2.5 hours from me. He's done some comparison video on the Ford and Fel-Pro gasket. Not at your level but just in packing and surface quality visible to the naked eye. Your HG video sealed...lol....the deal even more.
After my second ford gasket failure I switch. Now, there's a ton of info I can't spend time writing here. But, in short. My second set of HG's I sent back to Ford. Not wrapped or protected between the two gaskets. Just laying in the sealed box rubbing and scratching against each other. Next set loose in the box with a piece of cardboard between the two. I made up my mind then not to to use Ford HG's. Now of course there can be other issues for a HG failure. But a quality HG is a great start! Ford is not providing quality much anymore. The old saying... Planned obsolescence. For the 6.0. It was a rush to get engine out first to claim our diesels burn cleaner.
I'm off soapbox now!
Great info Jack as always!👍
@@eddylee587 Thanks, Eddy. As I started to say in another video comment section, I had used a back door open to me to talk a little about what they had done two years back. That door is now closed with Tennaco's purchase.
The advantage they had was designing the gasket around the failures and service industry. The disadvantage Int/Ford had was designing under the new manufacturing conditions. Int/Ford did update the gasket early on but did not address some of the issues in-field. While I liked the sealing material Ford gaskets have, I think the Fel-Pro is a better solution. It won't cure everything as I think the head design is poor, not so much the bolts.
With the first rework that failed and the second that did not, I would ask any change to the head or block surfaces other than the gasket?
@@toomanytoys On my second repair I really paid attention to how I was removing the old gasket material. I can't count how many cans of brake clean I used. Carefully sanding both block and head as I did before. Cleaned out every bolt holes.
On reassembly I used ARP's as b4 with their assembly lube. I ran each bolt all the way in and measured bolt length exposed. 2 were different by .0.125. Not sure if it would be something to be concerned about? But, I did thread chase each one afterwards. Used compressed air etc.. Each were within .010-.020. Reassembled and backing out the bolt once I bottomed out a whole turn. Making sure I used lube under each washer and nut, as b4. I spoke with a ARP tech decades ago when I was rebuilding SBF's and started using their products and he made the comment as to not run the bolt all the way in and to back it out half to full turn. Something I've maintained all these years. I guess there's the possibility of the bolt still turning a bit while installing the bolts and torquing??🤔. Made since to me so I follow that process and recommendation.
Sorry for the rambling.
Thanks for all your great technical information and videos! I wish we could have met. We have the same passion!,👍
@@eddylee587 The issue with the bottoming of a stud is that if it does turn, it adds to the force the threads see, the head side pulling up and the bottoming side pushing up. There is always thread distortion, but you can add more if the stud is bottoming and pushes up to the point of thread failure. With the washers, they should be lubed on one side only, the nut side. There are some motors where ARP suggests a few strokes of rough sandpaper on the head side of the washers to ensure the washers do not rotate but are only a bearing surface to the nut. Doubling the bearing surfaces can alter the force from the torquing.
Whenever I get to publishing the assembly video, you'll see where I mark the head, stud, and nut to indicate rotation. That will also help if anyone wants to check if the stud or nut has backed off in service. We're using this ARP super lube, so the static friction to prevent backing off is also lessened.
Ive watch every video (amazing videos, great info) and on the head gasket thickness i pretty much came with very close results as yours and Bpd, however everywhere I look online, felpro claims that their gasket is .041 compressed, but my micrometer doesn’t agree, and OEM claims to be .059, i have used heads down to 3.78 with the felt-pro gaskets without an issue but i always thought they really were .041 or .018 thinner than OEM, im dealing with a head that is 3.720 and i was trying to compensate with a thicker gasket, cometic sells one that is .067.
I guess the question is, why are we coming with this results when felpro claims their gasket is .041, did the person you spoke to mention anything about their gasket thickness.
THANK YOU!
In my discussion with the Fel-Pro engineer, as we went over this, he stated, "In that case of these gaskets, that is 1.586mm or 0.062".
I've never seen Fel-Pro give the dimension in literature, which is why I had the discussion directly. If you could provide the link, it would be helpful.
I'm in need of a long block. Have you heard of Asheville Engine? Your videos are great.
Ashville and Kill Devil are right now the best two places to get a long block. It's where I would go if I need one.
@@toomanytoys Thank you ill keep you posted on my build ( 2005 F250 Lariat 4x4).
I found information from Mahle regarding their gasket and after I called them they stated the thickness of their gasket to be 0.059" but they couldn't tell me if that measure was at the fire-ring or at the main gasket, but I found information on the Cometic web site regarding diferent thickness on their HG they provide a 0.053" a 0.062", and a 0.067" option, I'm going on a similar rabbit whole that you went thru and I would like to get your opinion on this they don't offer the 0.053" on the newer 20MM head option, do you know if Ford went away from the 0.053" on the later motors and that's why Mahle has gone to a thicker gasket on thier stuff since they are presumably the suppliers to Ford on the OE gasket, fantastic video by the way, I'm a fan of your work as a mechanical engineer that works in the manufacturing industry just watching your stuff, has helped me ton.
Thanks, Geri. I try to do these in the same vein as my old career.
I don't know of anyone who has measured the Mahle gaskets. BPD had a thread on PS.org detailing more than just the two I did, but again, not the Mahle. It's kind of disappointing they could not give a direct answer; I had no problem with FelPro, but it was more of a direct engineering connection.
www.powerstroke.org/threads/6-0l-head-gasket-comparison.971506/
But like FelPro, they would want to give a little more height to compensate for the possibility of decking the block with an aftermarket product. My numbers for my 20mm Ford gaskets were in line with the Ford 18mm gaskets that BPD measured, so I don't think Ford upsized the gaskets.
While Mahle may be the OE assembly line manufacturer, they would be constrained by the contract to not copy the product to the aftermarket. It may be more than just the coating, but I did not compare again.
I guess I'm also responding to you on FTE. Yeah, the 6.0L is a rabbit hole.
Love it
Love your videos!
Thank you!
@@toomanytoys Ended up o ringing/rebuilding a set of heads from an 09 for my 05 van.
Went with felpro. Doing good after two years.
You ever seen a 6.0l without exhaust manifold gaskets?
Both the motors in my truck. They are not part of the original design.
I can’t understand how anyone would need the fire ring setup for clamping load. We have studded a lot of f450s and f550s from blow egrs back in the day ,some still going, that tow a mid size excavator or skid steer daily which weight 6-8 tons with a loaded truck and dosnt blow head gaskets. So idk must be good marketing. Thanks for the video.
My undertanding is it's purpose is not clamping in the sense that the fire ring is, concentrating the compression on that ring, but to keep the fire ring from laterally moving, scrubbing the sealant loose..
Very interesting
I am trying to get my already studed 2007 f-250 lariat tow reliable. I have a blown headgasket. The shops i have visited say that they have been seeing the heads lift again when towing heavy. Would you recommend using a stronger stud to avoid lifting of the heads. Such as ARP 250-4205 CUSTOM AGE 625+ HEAD STUD KIT 03-07 6.0L FORD POWERSTROKE?
There are a lot of variables to this.
First, I'm not one who believes this is fundamentally a head bolt/stud problem. The clamping force with the stock bolts is about 4x the stock combustion pressure, so if you can only bench lift 100 lbs, it's impossible to lift 400 lbs. If you push higher numbers with a tune, you would still have a good margin.
I believe the fundamental issue with this four-bolt-per-cylinder design has two ways of looking at it. It should have had two more bolts per cylinder, or the head should have been designed like the 6.4L with the same bolt pattern, with more reinforcement to keep the head from distorting in the center.
If we are reusing heads and not machining them flat, no matter the Ford spec, it leaves for an early failure. But there is very little margin with these heads for machining, and the more you mill off, the weaker the head becomes - it can distort more easily.
@@toomanytoys i am leaning to getting the KDD heads.
@@susiervo1 Sorry, I lost this message trail. So far, they have been the best out there.
What head bolts do you recommend and what do you think about copper spraying the gasket to help seal on the block surface
With MLS gaskets, I wouldn't use the copper or any other sprays. As long as you are not using a tune, or maybe I should say an aggressive tune, the factory head bolts are fine, IMO. Buy ones from Ford or Navistar, not Fel-Pro or any other aftermarket supplier.
@@toomanytoys would or wouldn't
@@AJv-kb2pc Sorry for the confusion - I corrected the typo, and glad you caught it. Would not use any sprays with the MLS gaskets.
I had my stock heads o-ringed and I used fel-pro gaskets are you saying it not going to work or last?
Some o-ringed head suppliers do not support certain head gaskets with their products. It's best to ask the company who supplies the o-ringed heads what they say will or will not work. There is no way for us to know how one supplier's o-rings and gasket fire rings interact. Fel-Pro does not endorse o-ring as they have stated they have not tested all the different placements of o-rings.
However, I know of someone who had used non-endorsed gaskets, and he has been fine.
Is it just me or does it look like the cylinder openings are not round on the fel-pro gasket?
Both the Fel-Pro and OE are not round but provide setbacks in the valve areas.
So, stock heads and no o-ring... Which one is preferred the best for longevity OEM head gaskets or fel-pro head gaskets. Thanks
That's my setup, and I went with the Fel-Pro.
@@toomanytoys thanks for the quick response. About how long have u been running the fel-pro? Since then you've towed any weight for any duration?
Once again thanks for the updates cause I just bought a 2005 f250 6.0 with 223k miles and no issues (thank you Jesus!) Other thank leaking radiator, but thinking about going a head and doing ARP or Exotic head bolts with cab on. But the kind of guy that might just do the head gaskets since I'll be all over the top of the motor just by doing the studs.
One last thing, any other tips, tricks, pointers for longevity. Might get a tune with a few different ones like economy, tow... etc but other than that just want it to tow when needed and last for 400-500k. Thanks and y'all be safe.👍
@@Mreverything84 The truck has only done local runs with fuel prices. I'm not a fan of tunes, but ZMANN of PS.org pushed with a tune too hard and has a slight leak under high pressure. That has allowed him to try tunes to see which are less prone to bowing the head and getting it to puke. I would not do gaskets and ONLY ARP STUDS when it is needed.
I assume the Felpro the same as the MAHLE?
No, they are not. As I used my backchannel into Fel-Pro; they put some thought into what was happening and did a forensic analysis, too. I highly recommend their gaskets including over OE.