Hello,
Are the gaskets for the following parts necessary, or can they be substituted by gasket maker/RTV?
-water pump
-rear oil seal housing
-oil pump
-oil filter housing
-oil pan
-any other potentially unnecessary gaskets?


I know SR's use RTV in those places from the factory. It would be nice to just use gasket maker as I am in the process of refreshing a CA with new gaskets and seals and I am not a fan of the type of gaskets that end up breaking and making a mess that needs to be scraped/razored off the next time the part is removed.
Cheers.

The only one I'd go without a gasket on is the oil pan. Idk if a kit would come with it or not, but those cork gaskets are a pain. Everything else I wouldn't trust not to leak. I tried the oil filter housing without a gasket. I had a massive leak from there, although I used a FWD oil to water cooler and I couldn't pinpoint the leak. It may have just been the housing itself, but I didn't want to take any chances. So the last time I had it out I used a regular housing and a gasket.

What you could do (which is what I always do) is apply a thin layer of Ultra Black/RTV to the gaskets. It fills in the small scratches and imperfections and they're easy to remove if you ever need to. That oil pan will always be a pain, though

The oil filter mount, water pump, and oil pump housings HAVE to have a gasket. Those are all under pressure (the oil pump and oil filter mount can see over 75psi when the oil is cold) and RTV won't take the pressure.

Also, the water pump may need the gasket to act as a spacer to not only keep the pulleys lined up, but to keep the impeller placed where it should on relation to the block.

Makes sense. Thank you for the input.

While on the topic, would you gentlemen recommend OEM gaskets or the Cometic ones pictured above? Or are there any other preferred ones?
Sorry for all the basic questions, I have been searching but I am still quite new to CA's.
At the moment I am just trying to refresh an old motor with new seals and gaskets. Are there any specific main and rod bearings and piston rings that would be recommended? I plan to use the nice bits on another CA I am tinkering with on the side, but for the stock refresh I am curious if I could just get away with random auto parts store bearings and rings. Yet at the same time, I do not want to buy garbage that will only end up being more detrimental to the life of the motor.

I used the cometic on the last rebuild and I'm using them again on this rebuild (I actually just ordered that exact kit you got the picture from on FR sport). The cometic gaskets are... leatherier, LOL!!! I think they're still paper, but they seem more durable and compressible than the Nissan gaskets.

The only bearings I will recommend are OEM Nissan (they're hard to get), Clevite 77's and ACL Race bearings. DO NOT get the ACL Duraglides. They're junk. If you get the Clevites or ACL Race, you will have to take the crank, block, and rods down to a machine shop and have them check the oil clearances. From experience, (I've spent about 8 hours total checking oil clearances on this motor down to .00005" and playing with bearings to get the clearances where I wanted them) stock size bearings won't necessarily give you the correct oil clearance on all bearing locations. The best example I can give is on my motor. The bore in the block for the #1 main bearing and the #1 main bearing journal on the crank just happened to work out so that the ONLY bearing that will give the correct oil clearance was a grade 0 Nissan bearing. Even then it was on the tight side of the acceptable range. And before you say something about plastigauge, that stuff is crap!!!! To check, I plastigauge everything, and then checked it with a digital bore gauge (accurate down to .00016" +/-). If I had followed the plastigauge, the #1 main journal showed tight, but OK. After I checked it with the bore gauge, it was below acceptable (.0005" too tight). If I had run it that way, I would have burned up a bearing. That being said, all of the clearances that the plastigauge said was well inside the OK range, were inside the OK range. So if you want, maybe get the Clevite 77's or the ACL Race bearings and plastigauge the clearances. If ANY of them are near the limit, get the clearances checked.

Another thing about plastigauge. There is only one type that should be used on our motors for our oil clearances, and It wasn't easy to find. NONE of the autoparts stores carried it. It's I used the cometic on the last rebuild ... gauge PL-X. That site only carries it in huge quantities. To get a single 10 pack, I got it from ebay, http://www.ebay.com/itm/Plastigauge-PL- ... 5d41902043