Annealing a solid copper head gasket (2015)

My first go at annealing a Triumph head gasket when I was a young fella was fun, dropped it in a bucket of water and it turned out egg shape, only good for decoration/art after that.
I always anneal copper head gaskets or seals after the first failure and never had any problems, I like using the quench method, so long as the heating is uniform and correct red, which you can only see in a shaded area.

If all is correct after annealing and quenching, the gasket will be clean all over and ready for use, that is what I have found anyway, never had one fail and no leaks.

I like my Manx no head gasket, just a quick lap if needed.

Burgs

I believe that, unlike steel (with various alloying elements), the effectiveness of annealing of copper does not depend on cooling rate.
Therefore you can quench or not quench - the result will be the same so long as you reach a high enough temperature ( red is a good indicator)

L.A.B. said:

http://www.materialseducation.org/e...cs/Work_Hardening_and_Annealing_of_Copper.pdf

Click to expand...

Thanks for the detailed report L.A.B.
My reading is that my, simplistic, belief & advice above stands correct?

All my copper gaskets leaked oil from the pushrod tunnels until I started using the hi temp Pliobond sealer and .005" copper wire.

Annealing didn't help and if you check you'll probably find that there is no measurable change in dimension from crushing when using an annealed Cu head gasket.

There was an interesting article in the Real-Classic magazine last year which was discussed for a while here..

https://www.accessnorton.com/NortonCommando/head-gasket-trimming-idea.25176/

I wonder if anybody has tried this? I know Ludwig removed some of the material from composite gaskets to give a more uniform area of compression which makes absolute sense, but my feeling is that even greater advantage would be gained when using copper gaskets, as you are lessening the potential for non compressed areas of said gasket due to slight variations in gasket thickness etc.

Cheers,

cliffa.