Importance of Leak Testing

[nellyboyo]

Leak tested my new top end set up today and found a leak straight through the casting of this manifold. From the inside you theres nothing that can be seen by the naked eye ....But it does look dodgy form the outside...Would never have suspected a leak there .....Tidy

[nellyboyo]

Too many !yous! in there ...ha

[paul d]

I'd never build without a leakdown test now. Maybe it's the most important thing I've learnt in the last 5 years.

[corrado]

Doing my first one since buying a kit tomorrow, I'm dreading it.

[YAMLAM]

wouldn`t dream of not doing it now, but how many engines have we built since the early 80`s (in my case) where we didnt ( never heard of it ) . And id never heard of "Squish" until i bought a cast iron 5 port reed valve kit from taffspeed in the 90`s.

[Fux]

The last 6 engines I have built all had leaks.

Maghouse, exhaust manifold through a weld, base gasket and head.

Its easy to say it worked out fine before we started testing them but I reccon 90% of the problems I had in the past like holed pistons and kits that were realy hard to jet were air leak issues.