1990 Prelude Head Gasket Not Lining up?

1. why did you have the head milled?
2. why aren't you using an oem gasket?

if the holes won't align, it's not the right gasket. end of story.

I had the head milled to make sure I would get a good seal on the head gasket. I am using a Felpro gasket because it will be less likely to fail and the people at the machine shop i took it to recommended it. Most of the holes do line up, but the ones that do not are a few cooling holes. The cylinder holes, head bolt holes all line up. Looking up all other "compatible" gaskets, thay all have the same holes as the one I have, Including an OEM gasket I found. I am doing this from pictures, and can easily see that tey are exactly the same as the Felpro one I bought. My thoughts are that the gasket covers some of the hole in order to possibly restrict water flow and prevent the gasket from failing the way it did before.

I also thought it may be a different, better design, but I don't know if companies do this on gaskets. The engine code is B21A1 Thanks

-Aaron

FWIW, I've replaced head gaskets on other makes before and noticed the same sort of thing, but the passages were completely closed by the head gasket. Each time I had the old gasket and I saw it was the same there. But I think in every case the passage was only in one side (block or head) and not in both.

Mike

I would go to a Honda dealership parts dept and check it up against an OEM one there.

Restrict water flow? WTF? I highly don't think that is the case.

too late now, but you should never do that unless the head is either warped or you have an erosion problem. it messes up the compression ratio and can lead to valves striking piston crowns through insufficient clearance. it's not much good for sealing either as it's hard to machine aluminum to the surface finish necessary. the sealing surface on oem heads are near mirror finish.

there are very few after market components that meet the quality standards of honda oem, and even fewer that exceed them. if this was a ford or chevy, aftermarket is the way to go because oem is /so/ poor, but honda??? stick with oem.

you think correct - smaller holes do modify coolant flow. it's hard to get an even temperature throughout the block & head and modifying the flow in different areas makes it easier to achieve.