Head Gasket Brands

[mwolvinm]

I'm going to be buying replacement head gaskets soon due to a 1/2" long piece of metal in my combustion chamber causing a valvetrain crash. Does anyone have experience with the brands on rock auto for the head gasket sets? Looks like Apex, Ajusa, and Fel-Pro all have sets available. IIRC, the Fel-Pro are known to fail and are not recommended. What about the other 2? Mahle's are available for purchase individually, and for the bolts, Ajusa seems to be the only option, with only 1 set remaining. Valve options seem to be Melling only on Rock Auto.

[Z_Karma]

Mahle 5826 is what is generally recommended. I've used them and had no problems.
They may be stamped STONE or ISHINO but are the same, just rebranded.

Victor Reinz is also a preferred brand but in looking at the specs, their bore size is listed as 3.472 whereas Mahle is 3.57. Interesting

[kaur]

Could also consider getting OEM head gaskets from Nissan and other gaskets from RockAuto. If you have a decent source for OEM parts it shouldn't break the bank to get just the pair of head gaskets.

[mwolvinm]

Thanks for everyone's feedback. Looks like I'll go with the Mahle's. I can get them from Rockauto, just have to buy them separately. For reference, it looks like the OEM ones are NLA.

The sad part of this whole ordeal is the valvetrain crash trashed the performance camshaft and a set of the morgan adjustable sprockets. Fortunately, I still have the original gear/cam set.

[dark-divx]

I used a set of Ajusa.