Silicone gasket

[Matt Chapter]

After much abuse (aka landing on the valve cover a few times), one of my valve covers is warped.  For a while, I was doubling the stock gaskets, but then figured I could save some money / time and use a silicone gasket set.  I've been using the silicone gaskets for about 11k miles, maybe 4 or 5 years.

Well, now the non warped cover leaks, and after some investigation this is what my gasket looks like:



I suspect I've over torqued the valve cover nuts to cause this, but has anyone else experienced this?

I don't enjoy an oil covered boot, should I go back with stock gaskets or have another try with the silicone?

[donbmw]

I have been use the red ones from Real Gasket for years. They have not split on me.

Don

[mrclubike]

Just buy new Silicone ones
make sure   everything is  clean and dry when installing
You will not be able to torque them as much as a stock gasket

FYI
More than likely the head is warped
you can try to resurface the valve cover but it will not cure the problem if the head is warped

Before I had my heads rebuilt and the cover side resurfaced
The only thing that would seal the cover was the silicone gaskets
After having the head resurfaced the stock gaskets work just fine and can be reused many times

[Matt Chapter]

Ok, after installing a new silicone gasket, the leak is worse than ever.  Last night I got out a steel ruler and to my untrained eye the head is warped.  Yay!

Questions: assuming I can get the leak to stop (with two silicone gaskets), will it damage the head further to ride it?  Once I do get around to getting it repaired, I imagine I'll replace the rings as well.  Is there harm in only doing one side?  What else should I know about getting the head resurfaced?

[mrclubike]

No it wont hurt it any further riding it

You want to do both sides
They will need the carbon cleaned out any way and you want to keep it balanced

You can resurface it yourself if you have a flat surface as big as the head
Remove the head and disassemble it 
Glue or get some sticky back sand paper and attach it to your flat surface and rub the head on it in a figure 8 motion
A clean drill press table should work if it has not been abused

[Tony Smith]

Just use two (or more) stock gaskets and it will not leak. My heads are a bit "plastic' owing to much metal having been removed when they were ported and flowed. I tried silicone gaskets, but they leaked, wnet back to doubled up standard gaskets and they don't leak.

[skippyc]

I used very heavy glass eg small table top and sand paper to do all the surfaces on my BSA B50 and have no oil leaks.