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Small oil leak below head

motogtp

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I recently had CycleX redo the head and prep it for an MLS head gasket. After about 100 miles of riding I now have a very small oil leak below the head near the #1 and #4 spark plugs. Not much, just enough to wet the top two cylinder fins. I tried tightening the exposed head bolts in the spark plug holes. They were at 17 ft-lb when the engine was warm but not hot. Is there a way to fix this or am I looking at another project for this winter?
 
Did you have the top of the cylinder machined for MLS too? Copper coat on the gasket? Your stock cylinder studs may be stretching and loosing tension(this is the problem with the stock studs). I assume you used all new rubber pieces on the top of the cylinder and new rubber nickels.
 
Cylinder was machined for MLS too. I was a little surprised because the CycleX head surface was not as smooth as the cylinder top. I was told by CycleX not to use copper coat and to ditch the rubber sleeves and tubes. Evidently the sleeves were too big to fit into the MLS gasket holes. Did put in new rubber nickels though. Did I get some bad advice or misunderstand something? This is just a stock machine. Maybe I need to go back to a standard head gasket.
 
I use copper coat even with mls, yes you are not supposed to but when I was a mechanic Dodge cam out with a service bulletin to use copper coat on a new mls gasket to fix oil seeps. But you are not supposed to have to. I know it is a pain in the but to do but if it was me I would take out the cam and cam towers and retorque the head nuts and see how it goes from there. After that either way you will have to take it back apart and investigate the oil. Then it will be up to you to decide on what gasket you want to use again. Personally I have had good luck with the MLS and the only oil leaks from head gaskets I have ever had came from the Cycle X brand regular type gaskets. Two of them in a row on my 836 leaked oil after about 50 miles. I then switch to a good soft graphite gasket from Cometic which I got from Dynoman. These are similar to the good oem gaskets.
 
DD - thanks for pointing out the options. The leak is small enough to allow me to ride yet this season. Good winter project. I am thinking about the frame tube removal lugs so I can try a couple of things without having to pull the engine. Is that a tough job to pull off?
 
you will have to do a little welding. you cut the tubes and weld in the parts to make the tube removable. It can be done with the motor in frame...cover it with something fire proof from the welding sparks. These make life 100% easier.
 
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