One of the gaskets that seems to be prone to leaking on an engine is the header gasket. The constant change in temperatures from cold to hot to extremely hot can take its toll on a header gasket. Add boost to that mix and the temperatures rise even higher and many standard gaskets can blow out.

SCE Gaskets brought out their new Super High Temperature Graphite gasket and shared it with us in Indianapolis this past week. The new gasket is a densified graphite gasket proprietary to SCE, and was designed to take the heat much more than a conventional gasket, and incorporates Kevlar binders for tensile strength to keep the gasket center from blowing out. The Kevlar also keeps the gasket from flaking off in a turbo application.

Ryan Hunter explains that exhaust gas temperatures can get up to 2,000 degrees in a turbocharged application, and many ordinary copper gaskets can only withstand up to 1,300 degrees in the flange before they fail. Though the temperature in the center of the exhaust port is much higher than at the sides, the additional temperature and pressures can wreak havoc on ordinary gaskets.

Hunter said, “The turbocharger pressurizes the exhaust system and the back pressure sometimes, in a lesser gasket, will blow the cover right off the gasket. With the super-heated concentration of hot gasses coming out of there just makes it a disaster.”

The new gaskets are 1/8-inch thick and can compress up to 1/16-inch as the header bolts are tightened, providing a better seal, no matter where the header flange or weld bead sits. These gaskets will work for any high performance application up through full race applications.

SCE now has 95 applications for these gaskets, and that includes street blocks to Hemi race engines. Be sure to visit the SCE Gaskets website for more information about their new high temperature gaskets as well as their many other applications for both street and race vehicles.