[Flathead Fever]

I'm against the copper gasket on a street engine because of the electrolysis. They are fine for a race engine where a piston will eventually destroy the aluminum heads, so electrolysis will be the least of your problems. Modern manufacturers use composite gaskets because they help stop electrolysis and they can seal the different expansion and contraction rates of the iron blocks and aluminum heads. Edelbrock says to use Felpro composite gaskets with their flathead aluminum heads. Being a mechanic and seeing those composite gaskets last for 200K or even 300K miles on factory vehicles I won;t use anything else''

I have a Bonneville roadster I got from an elderly neighbor. Its powered by a Boss 302 that went 201 mph. It set the Class "D" Roadster Record at the last Muroc race at Edwards AFB. It has somewhere around 14:1 compression and they were turning it at 11,000 rpms. It does have copper head gaskets but at those rpms I bet the Yates aluminum Nascar heads would have never last long enough to get electrolysis. It's just garage art now. I can't afford to run a car like that. The engine parts alone were over $30K in the 1990s. They did their own machine work and assembly. Where there are extreme pressures copper gaskets are the way to go but on a 8 to 9.5:1 compression flathead they are not needed.

I'll give you an example of electrolysis between aluminum and brass that most of you are probably familiar with. A lot of the new garden hoses are coming with large aluminum threaded ends. I have 11 acres and lot of hose bibs. Every single one of those aluminum ends on a brass hose bib will not come off after just a few months because of the electrolysis between the dissimilar metals have welded them together. Yesterday I had to replace a hose bib that froze, and I could not get the aluminum hose fitting off. I had to cut the end of the hose off to remove the hose bib and then replace the hose end with a brass repair kit. I'm convinced the Chinese are doing this on purpose so they can sell hose parts.

Here is the only engine in my garage with copper head gaskets. I had nothing to do with the build I just got the good friend deal on it. He was going to sell it and I loved going to watch it run and couldn't stand to see it go. Now its collecting more dust than it did at El Mirage. It's a real Model A roadster body on a real boxed '32 frame at least that's the story. It's so modified its hard to tell. At least its Ford powered even if the only actual Ford part is the block. The most vicious small block Ford I've ever heard. It actually put goose bumps on your arms. I will never be able to affords to run it but I can't bring myself to get rid of it. I could drive it down to the mailbox and pop the chute. It didn't even come with an owner's manual on how to pack the chute?