Pain in the Astra: Part 8 Valve Cover Gasket Tips and Tricks

In this episode, I talk about little tips and tricks for doing a valve cover gasket. Whether you are doing it on an Astra, or any vehicle, I cover looking into needed parts, cleaning the surface, pros and cons to using silicone sealant for additional security. All in all, most valve cover gaskets are one of the easiest automotive gaskets to replace which is nice, because it's one of the most common to fail. Jump points are as follows:
00:00 Intro
00:17 May need more than just the Gasket
02:09 Silicone, RTV, Gasket Maker
03:56 Surface Prep
06:40 Round Gasket into Square Hole
08:04 Old RTV little problems
15:00 Hand Tighten Bolts
17:24 Check the Gasket is in place
18:58 Don't Over Tighten
19:59 All the small things
22:35 Blooper Reel
30 minutes of footage
2 hours of editing
This probably took less than 10 minutes to do the whole job
Plenty of lessons learned, like I really should have turned on the camera light for some of the scenes to help make the picture look better and possibly increase the resolution as I think some scenes went into night mode.

[@liamjett08]

What pattern and torque did you use for the Astra bolts? Great vid… cheers!

[@bigmikebeardwisdom]

I started from the center or worked my way out starting with finger tight to get the gasket set in place. I didn't have the torque spec for the valve cover and its not the easiest info to find online, but for a plastic valve cover going into an aluminum head, you don't need to make it super tight. With all my years as a mechanic, I have a feel for torque that comes with experience that I forget not everyone has. The idea it to make it tight enough that the gasket is sealed and the silicone rtv will aid in taking up minor gaps, while not over tightening it and breaking the plastic or stripping the threads. The pattern was the center bolt first to get the spark plug holes sealed, then around the outside watching that the valve cover was going down evenly and not binding the gasket making an opening for a leak. That's why I went finger tight all around first then tightened in the same pattern until it felt proper. Hope this helps, I tried googling the torque spec again and remembered what a mess that was to try to find.

[@jisharchatteysseri6877]

Can you do oil cooler replacement

[@bigmikebeardwisdom]

Yes, I did a video replacing the oil cooler, but I had already removed some other parts in the other videos. Hopefully your exhaust manifold nuts are in better shape than mine were. Here is the link for the Part 11 Oil Cooler Replacement ruclips.net/video/1OlttQxqQgU/видео.htmlsi=fn6tnquy-0vhyD0n