Changed valve cover gasket today. I took off the 11/16" nut that holds the braided ground at the back of the engine to gain a little extra clearance. Had a heck of a time getting the valve cover off and on and I suspect it was because of the upper radiator hose. It pushes against the valve cover. I would have taken it off but it didn't look like it was in any shape to be removed and put back on.

Do any of you remove the upper radiator hose in order to remove the valve cover?

Some pics just because:

 

no.

 

Hmmm. I had a real tough time getting the holes to line up because the hose butts right up against the valve cover below the hose clamp and pushes the valve cover towards firewall just a little bit. I shaved a little off and it was a bit easier. Maybe the gasket was part of the problem as well. Hopefully the valve cover won’t be coming off again for a long time.

 

I don't take mine off either. I also don't remove the ground strap.

Maybe it's because I have a '99 with the stamped cover? It came off with some minimal wriggling.

 

I ended up removing the upper heater core hose when I did my 89 because I couldn't wriggle the cover out. In hindsight I should have undone it before I got the cover loose to avoid getting any coolant in there.

+1 for using the high quality blue felpro gasket. Way better than the cork one that always leaks after a few years.

 

Have you used the fel-pro? I had some serious issues getting it to line up. Some holes would be good but others would have the metal of the gasket interfering with the bolt path by a tiny bit. It was a real pain.

 

here is a tip... use extreme care in routing the braided ground strap. If routed wrongly, it may rub on the wire harness, engine vibration may then cause the strap to act like a file, and tear into the wire harness. When I bought my jeep, the strap had been routed wrong and had cut through the sleaving, and some of the wire insulation on the wire harness that passes near it.

Metal braided straps, hose covering and such can act like a hacksaw from vibration. they have even been known to cut into engine blocks, tranny cases and such. Use Care in routing.

ps, nice clean engine bay you got there.

 

Huh… interesting! That strap on my jeep sits behind the wire harness loom that tees off from the injector loom. Doesn’t look like it’s in any danger of Chinese water torturing anything but I’ll double check it to be sure.

I was thinking of getting rid of the braided cable altogether for a larger gauge battery cable but I read a lot of articles that said that a braided ground strap is designed in a specific way to provide additional surface area. I cleaned up both sides of it as well as the block bolt/nut/retainer and firewall bolt and added a little oxgard.

My radio reception is garbage. Not sure if it has anything to do with the ground but once I get my new radio from Retro Manufacturing I’ll hook it up and see if the problem persists and I’ll go from there.

 

I used the blue silicon-on-metal FelPro. It lined up great for me being stiff instead of floppy like the cork one. Put it down, got the cover maneuvered into place, got the screws all started, then did the alternating pattern torquing them down. It took more torque than the spec in the FSM until the screws felt right, which is normal for that type of gasket. The rubberized cork piece of crap gasket, you have to glue to the cover first or you'll never get stay in place.

 

That’s not the experience I had with the fel-pro gasket but I think it is because the upper radiator hose, where it connects on the engine side… the hose below the hose clamp was butting up against the radiator side of the valve cover on the pass side so I had to grab the firewall side of the valve cover and pull it towards the radiator so that I could get it to line up. Even when I had the valve cover holes lined up there would sometimes be some overlap with the metal of the gasket. I don’t know. I don’t intend on having to take the valve cover off for a very long time but it was harder than I anticipated getting the bolts to line up. I was also a bit cautious because I wanted to ensure I didn’t strip anything.