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I work in their corporate headquaters. Lincoln has some wild awesome stuff going on! Sad part, I still have yet to weld something (and I too have a Lincoln mig welder in the garage sitting read to be used). Should see the "Virtual Welding" training rig Lincoln has, it's freakin' cool!

 

IMO you're setting yourself up for future headaches. Just make sure the flanges are flat and install the correct gasket along with some high temp copper permatex. TORQUE the flange bolts and problem solved. Threadlocker will prevent the need to double check torque after a few heating/cooling cycles.

 

Ok... Ill go ahead and give it a shot... The flanges are strait as an arrow and I'm using brand new gaskets.. I will tourqe them down to the 24 psi as well.. Thanks. Crossing my fingers .... Thanks for your input, much appreciated. Michael...

 

I just think that trying to stuff a doughnut between those flanges is going to create a bigger problem. The OE gasket that seals the flanges isn't very thick, so even minor warping can cause a leak. The main concern is to apply equal torque when you tighten the bolts. If tension isn't (close to being) equal the metal expands/contracts at different rates and warps. The permatex high heat copper will seal it unless you have a major warp. I used that stuff in place of header manifold and collector gaskets for years and never had it fail.

 

I may have answered it wrong..... I AM doing as you suggested, not using the doughnut gasket, using cooper Permatex with the oem gasket... Sorry for the confusion...mjclemm...