What's your gasket making techniques?

[kams1973]

I work on junk air compressors as a hobby and always have to make my own gaskets. I use a ball bearing and a ball peen hammer. Anybody have any better techniques.

 

[jhn9840]

http://www.harborfreight.com/9-piece-hollow-punch-set-3838.html

For 5 bucks not bad.

jhn9840
John

 

[reinhardt]

i have to cut gaskets all the time for various systems onboard navy ships being a navy contractor. i use a punch set similair to the one jhn9840 listed and a circle cutter. i know you can use a ball peen to transfer holes to gasket material. but i am curious about the ball bearing.... please elaborate.

 

[64cheb]

I use a brass hammer, a ball peen, Xacto knife, and my trusty crusty Craftsman sockets. I can replicate gaskets for just about anything.
I am a Motorcycle mechanic by trade and work on old cars as a hobby.

 

[kams1973]

I actually use the ball bearing to make bolt holes. Place gasket on part, make an indention with the ball bearing and strike w/ a hammer. Perfect holes every time. I am doing this, however, on cast iron. I also use a small open end wrench to cut tight radius corners. Works for me. I'm going to make some gaskets on aluminium parts in the near future and was concerned about deforming the edges of the part w/ the ball peen hammer.

 

[Brad54]

I've got my own gasket-making kit: A set of the punches as shown (don't know where mine came from), a sharp razor blade in a little box-cutter-style holder, and a small white plastic cutting board. Those, and a couple rolls of gasket material are in my tool box.

The cutting board makes sure I won't do anything stupid like use the cutters on a block of wood, the work bench or the floor when I'm in a hurry.

-Brad

 

[7echo]

The local water jet guys-they can laser scan the old one, draw what is missing(if anything) then cut it out.

 

[mtkst19]

i use the tiny hammer method. anything that without the gasket is metal on metal-- like an oil pan, i wont even use a gasket unless the gasket is needed for proper thickness. instead, i use loctite 574.

 

[GB Hicks]

I have several empty brass shell casings of diffrent calibers for cutting bolt holes in gasket material.

 

[mrpowderkeg]

I've used a razor blade. Then I got a gasket punch. It really sucked making a front timing cover gasket for a continental forklift engine. Took two hours with a razor, now it would take about 15 min with the punch set. And a scissors works good too for big stuff.

 

[Flathead Youngin']

everything mentioned here (and some new ideas for me) and sometimes one of these...

http://www.google.com/search?q=leat...&resnum=1&ved=0CDYQrQQwAA&fp=b2da8a77dcd93603