Copper cylinder head washers

The copper ones harden with age.
The outer ones need to seal to prevent oil weeping up from the outer oil gallery studs.
New ones are work hardened from new due to being stamped out of sheet copper when made and really need annealing before use.
Heat them till they glow orange and either let them cool naturally or quench in cold water .
Either way produces the same result but quenching removes any oxides and leaves them clean .

zed1015 wrote: The copper ones harden with age.
The outer ones need to seal to prevent oil weeping up from the outer oil gallery studs.
New ones are work hardened from new due to being stamped out of sheet copper when made and really need annealing before use.
Heat them till they glow orange and either let them cool naturally or quench in cold water .
Either way produces the same result but quenching removes any oxides and leaves them clean .

Makes some since and agree with dropping in water. My new washers are not leaking. Yea!

I re-use my copper washers by annealing, I also used to anneal the H1 copper head gaskets, especially when the heads used to be removed regularly