Long story short, I know my intake on my 1999 Dakota with 5.2 needs pulled off and the pan gasket replaced. I'm not into hot rodding the motor so my question is how many have fixed the pan gasket with out using the Hughes repair kit and not had any problems?
I can't really swing the extra cash for the kit. and the gaskets are only $33 and change at NAPA for the Fel-Pro kit. can extra care be done in the repair and not have a problem down the road. Can some high temperature silicon be used to help hold the gasket in place? This is my first Dodge Truck and doing mechanical repairs is not a problem for me. I just want to do it right. I worked in the Aluminum foundry years ago when the Magnum manifold was in Prototyping, I always wondered how they were going to seal that big hole! Now I know.

 

granted this pertains to a BBC, i might as well say it-

We just use standard intake gaskets on both cylinder heads, then put about a 1/4" tall bead of standard silicone along the front and back edges of the block. Works fine for us in race conditions @ 7200 RPM.

 

At 160,000 miles, I am due for a second replacement of the gasket. The original owner had it replaced like a year prior to selling it to me. I have owned it since '04.

Personally, I don't think that is too bad for $30 and a day of work. One thing I will say is that mine is leaking REALLY bad this time around. The intake has an impenetrable coat on it, and it is leaking out the back pretty significantly as well. And the leak developed REALLY quick. I went from using no oil at all between changes to using a quart in a week in a matter of a single oil change...

I don't know if that is always the way it happens when the gasket goes bad or not, but I do know that I went from having a truck that I was willing to drive anywhere, anytime, to having a truck that I really just thought should be parked until I got it fixed. So, it has been parked...

Just my experience, of course, so take it for what it is worth...

 

Mines leaking bad too from Minnesota to Ohio 980 miles 5 qts of oil.

 

Well, to be honest, if you don't have the money for the Hughes kit, new gaskets are better than using all that oil. 5 quarts of even the cheapest oil you can buy is approaching half the cost of the gasket. Even if it only lasts a year, then it will have saved you money...

 

If you have the money you could try these guys: http://www.apsprecision.com/billetplenum.html

Not quite as spendy as Hughes but still somewhat expensive.

I just did the Hughes belly pan swap this past weekend (didn't know about APS until this week). Took me two days because I didn't have two tools. The longest part of it all was the cleaning and removing of the old intake gaskets. What a pain but worth it.

None-the-less, even if you don't do the aluminum belly pan swap, a new gasket should last about 30,000 - 60,000 miles if done right.

Here's what I suggest:

1. Buy the gasket maker "The Right Stuff". Expensive but weeellll worth it.
2. Clean off the old gasket material until it's baby smooth on both the belly pan and the heads and intake.
2a. Use Fel-Pro gaskets. The intake gaskets will be silver looking and come with the two rubber/steel end caps.
2b. Before installing the intake put a large dab of "The Right Stuff" in the corners where the rubber end caps meet the silver intake gaskets. Don't want it leaking there.
3. When installing the belly pan and intake, torque everything very evenly. The intake bolts only need up to 12 ft. lbs. and should be done in a specific order. The belly pan bolts also only require just a few foot pounds of torque. I'd use blue loc-tite on those.
4. When you have the intake out and the belly pan off, check the pcv port. I found that my pcv has been sucking oil. Now I'm looking into a catch can.
5. Oh and you'll need a T40 torx to take off the fuel rails.

 

Well I think I'll bit the bullet and get the kit,
but I think I got more problems than that.
I pullled a compression test and it's all over the place from 160 to 125psi.
Looks like if im tearing it down might as well get into the heads to see what needs done.