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They physically fit in both locations, and for a while now people have been installing the supertech exhaust ones on both sides.
In fact, this is what I was told to do by the vendor who sent me the set of supertechs that's sitting here next to me on my desk.
Notice both sets are blue.
But this begs the question, are people installing the supertech intake seals on the exhaust and they can't handle the heat?
Originally Posted by wackbards
Meh. I put supertech's I ordered from 949 on the head I just refurb'd. We'll see how they do.
I remember being surprised that they were color coded, but the colors seemed unintuitively backwards: like the blue ones go on the exhaust valves and the brown ones on the intake. From a human factors design perspective, it seems like you'd want it the other way around. I'm curious whether the root of the problem is that either they got the part numbers switched, or people are putting the blue ones on the intake by mistake.
The part number for the intake has an "I" in it VS-T6I vs the "E" for exhaust VS-T6E
Question for you guys with the ST seals. Are you running double springs? ST valves?
I ran ST heavy double springs, ST valves, ST seals. Seals leak out of the box on two different sets. OEM are perfect. I don't care if they fix the problem and give them away, I'm not running them again. OEM are cheap and work perfect, so there's nothing to fix as far as I'm concerned.
I know. I just ordered oem seals. But there is some misinformation in this thread that I wanted to clear up.
Are they seriously 120 a set? I have run fel-pro seals as well and they worked fine too. There is no way felpro are that much. That's crazy if mazda really charges that much for valve seals.
i put supertechs in mine before hearing about this. Just got the motor running and sure as hell, it smokes when i give it revs after idling. **** you supertech.
Are they seriously 120 a set? I have run fel-pro seals as well and they worked fine too. There is no way felpro are that much. That's crazy if mazda really charges that much for valve seals.
Felpros are cheap. I read in your thread you have had great success with them, so i am going to pull my **** supertechs out and toss the felpros in. Thankfully i have the nice tool that allows that to happen without pulling the head.
Yes. I've seen other people have better luck with felpro. I would try those. But I just bought a full vvt gasket set for spares.
they are less than $100 through Mazdacomp. At least $120 through dealers.
I'm amazed that these are still sold.
Thanks for posting this and fixing my post above, that's crazy. To be honest I've never had anything Fel-Pro makes function any less than an OEM gasket on any car I've owned. I usually buy mazda to be safe, but Felpro is so much cheaper I'll probably just run Fel-Pro everything in the future.
Damni I'm glad I saw this now. I have both supertech and stock valvesteam seals sitting here for the head rebuild this week! Guess I'll be going with stock
Question for you guys with the ST seals. Are you running double springs? ST valves?
Stock everything. Tried finding the pics I took when I pulled the head back off with no luck, IIRC every port had some oil present. Should have left the 170k km seals in, no smoke before the rebuild.
Thanks for stickying this, wish I had known this 4 months ago. I put supertech seals in my parents miata a little while back, looks like I'll be replacing those soon.
Reply from Martin at Supertech (bold + ul is mine);
There is not much to it, when it comes to seals, and they are rubber, which means that when installing them, you can tear the rubber, which is what is happening to most customers, there nothing different from one seal to another then material, you do have to make sure you use the exhast seal (blue) on the exhaust side, the intake seal will not work properly on the intake side as they are not made for high temperatures.
Can't speak to how people install seals. I installed mine using a medium plastic straw that slipped over the valve stem and let the seal slip over the edge of the stem easily.
So it looks like 949 Racing offers their "super miata valve seal", which come from the same supplier for fel pro according to the their website. Supermiata Valve Seal Miata
Thanks for the link @konmo, I ordered a set this morning. We'll see if they can get here before the weekend so I can install them.
Also, who is doing your head? I just saw you posted up trying to find a machine shop a couple months ago. I'm very local, so very interested who you ended up going with. Also, I posses valve train disassembly tools and happy to loan them out, if you don't want to buy a set.
Originally Posted by konmo
Also TSE sells the Supertech valve seals on their site. Supertech Viton Valve Seals I wonder if Andrew has had any issues with them? Hopefully he can chime in with his opinion on this.
That's where I ordered my set of replacement STs for the leaky STs that are in my head now. I ain't even mad tho, vendors are generally at the mercy of their distributors. Just like the Boundary front main seal thing we've been discussing. @Savington, care to weight in?
Originally Posted by bahurd
Reply from Martin at Supertech (bold + ul is mine)
<Blame the customer rubbish>
******* Keegan installed mine. Where is your God now, Martin at Supertech?
All that Dominator going into the exhaust certainly keeps the roofs of my exhaust ports clean.