Valve cover gasket leaking after replacement

[colo525i]

Replaced my crunchy dried up valve cover gasket and the spark plug rings. The gasket is now leaking worse than the old one. I made sure to tighten it gently, only a few ft-lbs. Any suggestions on sealing it up?

[Phatty5BMW]

Did you clean all of the contacts on the head and the valve cover really good to make a good seal? Try cleaning and re-torquing the bolts down. As long as it is clean from oil and whatever else it should seal just fine.

[acidfire52]

Mine is doing the same thing. Only leaking very lightly.

I plan on taking it off again, making sure everything is clean and retorqueing all the bolts. Hopefully it will stop my leak

[Phatty5BMW]

It should, I will be re-doing the gasket on my e28 again also, it didn't seal. I just bought a new gasket again and make sure its super clean this time. I didn't use carb cleaner on a rag to wipe this time. Will defenitly do it next.... Saves this issue :)

Pat

[baksa]

Replaced my crunchy dried up valve cover gasket and the spark plug rings. The gasket is now leaking worse than the old one. I made sure to tighten it gently, only a few ft-lbs. Any suggestions on sealing it up?

Maybe it's the valve cover to blame, and not the gasket, maybe cover is curved or distorted over the years, anybody considered that?

[Dave M]

Replaced my crunchy dried up valve cover gasket and the spark plug rings. The gasket is now leaking worse than the old one. I made sure to tighten it gently, only a few ft-lbs. Any suggestions on sealing it up?

When you say a "few ft-lbs", do you mean 15? Its either 15 NM or 15 ft-lbs. If you hand-bombed it, try a torque wrench. Its a good excuse to buy one if you haven't;)

Good luck,

Dave