I have the right side engine cover off in order to deal with the leaking kickstart plate/seal (I've cut a GASKET for it, drilled the 4 mounting holes larger, and spot-faced each hole to prevent the screw heads from limited positioning of the plate, and installed a new seal).
While the cover is off, I got to thinking about the quality of the sealing that should occur between the oil pump OUTLET (via an "o-ring" seal) and the oil filter INLET hole that is in the right side cover. The "o-ring" is actually a quite hard nylon or polyethylene material, not very resilient, flat on the backside.
It seems to me that it is pretty much by chance that the pump OUTLET will seal POSITIVELY to the oil filter INLET when the right hand cover bolts are cinched up (variables may include: "o-ring" thickness; side cover gasket/sealant thickness; cover bolt torque; side cover distortion hot versus cold; etc.)
Has anyone experimented with a REAL o-ring instead of the nylon? seal?
Other fixes? Opinions?
Some folks will probably reply, "just assemble the darn thing and hope!" The trouble is, the lubrication of the whole engine relies on the integrity of this OUTLET to INLET seal!
I was blissfully pleased with the design of the new UCE engine until this puzzle came to mind....