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Hey all,

Quick vehicle info - 1950 2302-5, 327, Carter WDO-643SA

Alright, been diving down a rabbit hole. My carburetor is coming back from the rebuilder for some warranty work, and I have my freshly milled and torqued from the inside-out intake/exhaust manifolds hung and ready to go.

I hopped on here and utilized the handy search feature to look for questions pertaining to this topic and came across the Service Counselor that mentioned two different types of gasket material used on either side of the insulator, and those sometimes getting switched, leading to swelling of the gasket and blocking of the "vacumeter passage."

Fast forward - I have my two new "BEST" gaskets and a NOS insulator (that has all four layers, instead of the three with cracks my old one had). Given that a. the new gaskets don't seem to match the description in terms of materials used/construction of what Packard ended up supplying as replacements for their carburetor/manifold gaskets, and b. the surfaces of the new gaskets are either flat (the side with text on it), or sort of puffy (solid gray):

1. Are there different gaskets that should be used than those supplied by BEST?

2. If it matters, what is the correct orientation of the gaskets relative to the insulator (text sides facing the insulator, or text sides facing the metal surfaces)?

3. Perhaps the bigger curiosity, I took some pictures with the throttle body of my parts carb (also a WDO... not sure if it's a 643SA, but this setup is the same on my carb) with the new gaskets. The blue arrow points to the starter switch passage that is only partially obstructed by the gasket. The screen and check ball are at the end of the passage. Should this passage be partially open like this? The red arrow points to the vacumeter passage and how it looks with the gasket; there is a machined passageway that I would guess is enough, but wanted to confirm if any modification of the gasket was necessary.

Basically just want to make sure what I have is correct and make sure I'm using best practices for attaching the carb to the manifold.

Thanks, everybody!

Joe

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The new gaskets are of different material than was used then. To be on the safe side you could cut a little notch to correspond with the relief on the carb but I have never bothered to do that. The starter switch draws no significant quantity of air and only needs to not be covered.

The new gaskets are of different material than was used then. To be on the safe side you could cut a little notch to correspond with the relief on the carb but I have never bothered to do that. The starter switch draws no significant quantity of air and only needs to not be covered.

Thanks for the response on this, Ross. Appreciate it!

I've never seen gasket material that's "one-way" in heat transfer, so the exposed side doesn't matter.
The perceived difference in texture is probable how the lettering was rolled on/transferred since it's not on both.
Usually, the thickness is the critical parameter for fitment and getting the torque right so it don't leak.
Don't overthink it. These things are so low HP, that it's not significant, if intake is not hyper tuned.

That makes sense! Easy to not just go down rabbit holes, but to tumble down them. I mainly got to thinking that one surface or side of the gasket was meant to seat against the casting and the other for the phenolic insulator.

Out of curiosity, are there opinions on torquing the carburetor down? I've mostly seen "snug; don't overtighten." In the '51-'54 service manual spec, it suggests 15-18 ft. lbs. for the carburetor stud nuts. That about where I ought to be for a WDO on 1950 as well? Thanks again!