Valve Cover Gasket

[FordExplorerGuy]

I've been working on my Explorer to make sure she's running good. I will be turning 16 in about a month and want to make sure everythings good.
I've been Saving and saving to buy everything myself, so i've finally come to the conclusion to buy everything now.
So heres, my problem. When i drive a lot, or even just a few miles i smell oil burning and found that it is seeping very very slowly out from the valve covers. So, i was wondering if anybody had any tips on brands of gaskets, or prices for gaskets. Thanks, any help would be great. And anything else to improve my X's performance would be great, I've got about $400 saved. thanks

 

[ajevenson]

You can pic up this felpro valve cover set for about $20-30 depending on your area. The two on the left are for the intake, dont need em but you get em anyways...

 

[DeagleDave]

did mine a couple weeks ago, i got felpro unfortunately they're cork but i think that's the only kind they make. couple of tips:

1) Have a scraper handy. Those are probably the stock gaskets and more than likely some part(s) will stick. If you have access to air tools use the die grinder and a pad to really clean the area the gaskets will cover.

2) Use a solvent to clean the inside of the valve covers while you've got em off.

3) Soak all the nuts and bolts in some solvent or wash them with it to get all the grime off.

4) Make sure to have a torque wrench handy so you can correctly tighten the bolts down. You can find the torque specs in a Haynes or Chilton's Manual.

5) Keep a rubber mallet around. Those valve covers may not want to come off on their own, might take a little "encouragement."

 

[FordExplorerGuy]

Alright thanks guys. Im hoping on getting everything off this weekend. But here in Nebraska its recently gotten pretty cold so,...hopefully it won't take that long.

 

[88vert]

If you buy them from Ford they are rubber and metal

 

[DeagleDave]

well damn it, i bought mine from ford and the valve cover gaskets were cork...

 

[Kris Guilbeaux]

get the metal and rubber ones from ford. the Cork ones will fail quickly. I have the Metall and rubber ones on my Navajo and they have been on there for years with out problems. Installed a set of cork ones on my Moms X once and they failed again one year later so replaced those with metal and rubber ones as well.

 

[LukeDog3D]

you can buy fel-pro metal/rubber valve cover gaskets at auto-zone as well...I want to say they're about 15 dollars or so.

 

[SteveVB]

Ford gaskets

I will also vouch for the metal/rubber gaskets - I would not use anything but the Ford gaskets for the valve cover and the intake gasket. They are far superior to the cork they replace dont use much sealer(two spots on the head/block) I have had my valve cover gaskets for almost three years with no problems also.