Horizons Unlimited - The HUBB - Rocker Cover Gasket leak

Hi Chris,

My current mileage is about 20kmpl or 60mpg, this is includes about 20-30k luggage. This has been constant throughout the journey to India until I started having the gasket problems - then it came down to about 15-17kmpl.

Which leads me to my Rocker Gasket fiasco - as I've now taken 3 attempts (6 hour sweaty job in India!!) to fix it... Lets just say that the terminology is all important, as on speaking to my garage I thought they said to make sure a gasket was used for the Rocker Cover, when in fact they just meant the Rocker Cover Windows. So I merrily marched off and tried to add a gasket to wrong bit, so compounding the problem.

All I actually initially had was a leaky front left bolt of the Rocker Cover Head. If this is encountered I would just recommend that the individual bolt is removed, use some liquid gasket paste on the bolt & retighten to correct torque.

Please note
- the Rocker Cover Window(s) DO require a paper gasket (removed to set/check valve clearances) - one of intake, one for exhaust.
- the (what I will call) - the Rocker Cover Head DOES NOT require a gasket. As I have discovered - this requires a torque wrench (20Nm for outer bolts, 8Nm for inner) to set the exact tolerances. You need to use the (I don't know the same sorry) white rubbery paste. This is used as it flattens down very thin, & won't introduce a gap between the tappets & valves. If you don't have this paste - woodglue is an excellent substitute.

So very pleased with myself, I removed the Rocker Cover Head and discovered it was 'destroyed' (Of course I said - that's why there was a leak!!!). So in the first attempt I just used normal liquid gasket (RED) paste, which worked for about 50kms then the leak happened again from the original bolt. By using the paste in a place where no gasket should be you are actually increasing the gap between the tappets & valves, but not by much, and as the cam chain now uses bearings to align itself (instead of using the rocker cover Head to align itself), there is minimal chance of damage (thank god!).

As the leak was minimal - I ran with it for a period of 4 weeks keeping an eye on the oil level, but eventually it became too great so I had to fix again, but this time with a paper gasket (which took me hours to make). Only after completion of the job & starting the engine, did I discover the chattering racket being made by the now large gap between tappets & valves.

After ringing my garage in shock, only then did I discover that I had to repeat the days work, remove all traces of gasket & paste, locate a quality Indian torque wrench (which actually fits into that tiny space) and find some woodglue only to be used v. sparingly on the outside of the Rocker Cover Head. All this done however and she's purring like new and the mileage is excellent again.

Hope this is in some way clear, but I don't expect so - it's taken me 4 weeks to figure all out!

Cheers
James