B21 ft block water passages

I noticed when I pulled the head that on the bottom of #4 cylinder there are 2 water passages (sideways teardrop-shaped) the 2nd one in was partly covered by the head gasket.
The first gasket set I bought 6yrs. ago that was Elring and the other one I just bought was the same kit. The website said that the kit fit my B21 engine.
So has anyone noticed this before?

There are two versions of these cylinder heads. large coolant passages and small coolant passages. The head gasket is made to work with either type. You probably have a large coolant passage head unless it's a very late model B21FT. So some covering of the passage isn't going to affect anything.

PS if you can post a picture of the head surface. We can easily tell you if it's a small or large passage head. Your car being an 85 it's very hit or miss as compared to the earlier cars which are large passage heads.

I know what you're talking about. I always assumed that the coolant holes in the gasket were sized to adjust the cooling.

If you go down the two sides of the gasket, the holes are:
Exhaust side (on the right below): Medium Medium / M M / M M / Large (teardrop) Large,
Intake side (on the left below): Tiny Medium / None Tiny / None Tiny / None Large


Some go nowhere, other go on top of teardrop shaped coolant passages. Here's pics of a ~83 B21FT block and a K-Jet 160 head (click for full size):
<a href="https://ibb.co/x16KmBt"><img src="https://i.ibb.co/x16KmBt/B21-FT-Block.jpg" alt="B21-FT-Block" border="0" /></a> <a href="https://ibb.co/s3LMvB4"><img src="https://i.ibb.co/s3LMvB4/B21-FT-KJet-160-Head.jpg" alt="B21-FT-KJet-160-Head" border="0" /></a>

dl242gt said:

There are two versions of these cylinder heads. large coolant passages and small coolant passages. The head gasket is made to work with either type. You probably have a large coolant passage head unless it's a very late model B21FT. So some covering of the passage isn't going to affect anything.

PS if you can post a picture of the head surface. We can easily tell you if it's a small or large passage head. Your car being an 85 it's very hit or miss as compared to the earlier cars which are large passage heads.

Click to expand...

Thanks for the reply, yes I have the large coolant passages.

bobxyz said:

I know what you're talking about. I always assumed that the coolant holes in the gasket were sized to adjust the cooling.

If you go down the two sides of the gasket, the holes are:
Exhaust side (on the right below): Medium Medium / M M / M M / Large (teardrop) Large,
Intake side (on the left below): Tiny Medium / None Tiny / None Tiny / None Large

Some go nowhere, other go on top of teardrop shaped coolant passages. Here's pics of a ~83 B21FT block and a K-Jet 160 head (click for full size):
<a href="https://ibb.co/x16KmBt"><img src="https://i.ibb.co/x16KmBt/B21-FT-Block.jpg" alt="B21-FT-Block" border="0" /></a> <a href="https://ibb.co/s3LMvB4"><img src="https://i.ibb.co/s3LMvB4/B21-FT-KJet-160-Head.jpg" alt="B21-FT-KJet-160-Head" border="0" /></a>

Click to expand...

Thanks for the pics,I'm glad I wasn't the only one to see this.