I have a 95 bullet 500cc. I recently did a valve job. I torqued the head to the specs, and can not get a good seal, it's leaking oil around the seal. Anyone have any ideas?
There are a lot of people who advocate annealing the head gasket. Both the Yahoo RE forum and Hitchcock's message board have had threads on this. There doesn't seem to be much controversy about whether or not do do it; just discussion on
how to do it.
Here's a snippet from one thread:
Annealing head gaskets Posted By GeorgeE On 2007-06-05 At 15:58:56
Have just surfaced the head for my Super Meteor and am ready to replace . I seem to recall two variations on annealing the copper gaskets One to heat it up then plunge into water . The other to heat up and let cool down naturally . I have no experience with copper gaskets but it seems that a quick plunge in cold water would distort the gasket and with only 22 pounds torque( or thereabouts ) recommended it would seem the flatter the better . But then again what do I know ? Thanks in advance for any help .
George
Follows Ups
Posted By John E On 2007-06-05 At 16:18:54
Both work but if you let it cool naturally it forms an oxidised layer on the surface where plunging into water takes the layer off leaving a clean surface, copper "work hardens" --the more you work it (bend-hammer etc)--the harder it gets--- oooh-err mister!!
)
Posted By DaveT On 2007-06-05 At 20:11:53
I always thought that you had to quench the gasket in water to get the proper effect. A quick search and and I found this from the Proceedings of The Royal Society Volume 80 No. 535 December 9th 1907
"It is common knowledge that hard copper becomes perfectly annealed by heating to 500 C; that the heating need not be for any lengthened period, and the rate of cooling afterwards is unimportant."
Posted By John R On 2007-06-06 At 13:05:14
Image Link http://
So, we should be going for 700-800 degrees to anneal copper. How does this compare to a gas flame on the cooker or a blowtorch?
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Posted By mikey On 2007-06-06 At 15:21:23
I always work around my solid copper gaskets by heating one portion on gas ring to cherry red then plunge into water
I then move to next part of gasket. It works for me.
I do not have facility to heat whole of gasket in one go.
Cheers
Mikey
Posted By Les H On 2007-06-06 At 16:32:21
Bright yellow 1093°C
Dark yellow 1038°C
Orange yellow 982°C
Orange 927°C
Orange red 871°C
Bright red 816°C*
Red 760°C*
Medium red 704°C*
Dull red 649°C
Slight red 593°C
* Looks like any RED colour will do then!
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Here's some more discussion:
http://www.xvo73.dial.pipex.com/ht/cuanneal.htmhttp://www.britbike.com/ubb/cgi-bin/ultimatebb.cgi?ubb=get_topic;f=11;t=002278;p=1Matt