About a month ago I installed headers- and had a lot of problems with the drivers side because the copper RTV was drying up as I was installing (it wasnt hard yet) - but it was about half an hour - 45 minutes before it was sealed - there was RTV over everything and it was a mess. Reason for this is ther ewas extra ceramic coating I had to get out of the bolt holes to get the bolts thru the flanges. Anyways, so that was the deal with that side, and the passenger side I avoided RTV sealant completely because I had a bad experience with it on the drivers side.

So my questions are - should I be concerned about leaks using RTV on one side, and not on the gasket on the other side? What if I wanted to change the gaskets - would the copper RTV be hard to clean up??? Also, some bolts were being stubborn and they may all have not been tightened inside out - should I g oback and re do it or is it not worth it - im worried about warped flanges ---- FINALLY, what do you reccommend I do? Just leave it and see if I end up with leaks and stop stessing over it? Im at school right now and these things tend to bother me over time, so I just wanted to ask these ?'s - thanks!

 

You should re-torque you header bolts several times over a couple weeks to stop them from falling out later and causing a big leak What gaskets are you using? I used the Mac copper gaskets with no RTV and have no leaks at the flanges. I also had to re-torque the bolts every couple of days for 2 weeks before they stopped loosening up.