This is rather embarrasing, I picked up a manifold gasket the other day for my '77 and it turns out the n42 head I have and the head I SHOULD have are rather different. I have diamond exhaust ports on the gasket and rectangles on the head.... Ouch. This isn't the worst part. I put them on before realizing the error. Anyhow, with luck the parts store will take them back as a gesture of goodwill

My problem here, though, is that the headers don't seem to align very well. I believe they're MSA (They have a thick bar running along the bottom that flares on the ports) hell, here's some pics. Anyone else have this problem? How do you fix it?

Grind the tops of the flanges to fit under the thermostat housing, or not?

For one thing the gasket is for a P-79 head for a NA ZX engine. I recommend that you get the gasket from Motorsport and get the one they have for the headers the heavy duty one. I don't know what combination you have but my headers fit with no problem . However I am running a P-79 head. Did this combo you are working with something new ? the head in the pictures dosn't look like it was just re done. Are you installing a new set of headers from another engine ? Gary

Ummm, no. The engine has been redone, but quite some time ago. Hasn't seen nearly as much driving as sitting in a driveway with the hood vents off (created some serious dirt buildup! Not to mention leaves!) The head is an N42 the block an f57 and the car came to me in this odd patchwork condition. The gasket isn't shown in the picture, but it IS for a 77 and has diamond shaped ports.

It had the MSA gasket before. Didn't do the trick and fell apart on removal, so I thought I'd try the fel. Not much of a risk at 10$.

Maybe I'll just bolt it up and see what happens?

Nevermind, it seems this gasket is called for from 75 to ZX according to the supplier. Odd.