I hate people who put the cheap aftermarket chrome **** on their engines - well let me rephrase...I hate people who do all that and then I buy their truck to have to deal with the b.s. that follows shoddy hardware lol

Currently noticed a leak comin out of my thermostat housing water neck and thought eh no big deal just a gasket problem. Pulled the thing off and noticed the chrome neck had an inner O ring + the felpro gasket that was added to it. Went to the store and bought a new gasket even when I noticed there wasn't anything wrong with the one I took off (decided to put a new thermostat in while I'm at it). So I get back and put everything back together but after I put the radiator hose to the neck, water and air was squeezing out the bottom of the neck. Pull the stupid thing off again and re-assess the situation. Decided I would go back and try to get an OEM neck - O'Reilly's don't have one. Went to Autozone. They don't have one. Picked up a new gasket and decided to try the neck w/o the O ring and just the gasket. Miserable failure.

Ordered the OEM neck and it should be in tomorrow morning. Better work!

Yeah easy fix but eh I'm hungry and grumpy lol.

 

I had one off those cheap aftermarket waternecks with the o-rings. It was soo warped from them it leaked really bad. Finally put on a mill and put it straight then put a regular gasket on it. Been fine since I redid it.

 

Why did you go through all that crap when you could've just bought an OEM housing?

 

if you have a water neck with an Oring you should never try to use a gasket, they don't work been there done that.
I personally prefer to have GOOD water neck with the oring seal myself but I agree you get what you pay for. If I am going aftermarket water neck I buy GOOD alum versions instead of stamped steal chrome.

 

I already had the crappy crome one and had the mill at work so that was free.

 

So I put on the OEM neck and gasket and thought done deal. Eh still leaking. Looks like it's coming up through one of the bolt holes (closest to carb) WTF!!!

I tightened it down a little more...hopefully that'll kill this stubborn a$$ leak!!!

 

Just put some gasket sealer on the bolt threads like you should have done to start with. Any bolt that goes into a water jacket should always have sealer on it or Loctite. Anything as threads will not always form a water tight seal.

 

I always use Permatex/Locktite PST thread sealant w/ Teflon on anything that threads into the water jacket.
YMMV