Good day, I’m a fellow CXer from Serbia and have been following this great forum for a long time. I’m wondering has anyone installed the cellulose nitrile oil pan gasket on the Reflex Athena engine as made by Ajusa or Corteco since the original cork seems to be no longer available? Even CX Basis sells only the new one. I’m concerned about handling the weight of the engine long term since it rests on the oil pan, the original gasket has metal inserts where the bolts go.

Hello,
Good luck finding it, I do not know maby mr Peter Bonhof has got one, but all that stuff comes from demolished cx, I want to ask him if you want.
Greetings from Wim

Hi, thank you for your help. I ordered the nitrile gasket, I just wanted to hear fellow CXers experience on how the cellulose rubber copes with engine weight long term having no metal inserts as in the original since I’d really like to avoid doing it again on the Douvrin in the near future as you well may imagine. In the meantime I found out from people who mounted it years ago there’s no problem engine weight wise and it’s much better sealing than cork which always leaks eventually, especially since it’s no longer made and everything you find on Ebay is NOS and dried up. I’m a big enemy of RTV silicone and sealing coumpounds of any kind since I don’t trust their oil resistance long term and they have been known to tear apart in small pieces that can eventually clog the oil pump or oil passages and wreck the engine. That said, the rubber gaskets you get in the sealing kit are a pretty crappy design so when I resealed the engine recently I used the factory prescribed Rhodorseal 5661 on the bearing caps which was originally there when I took them off. Renault mentions using it with a hardener which is nowhere to be found, even by part no. so I contacted the Rhodorseal manufacturer and it turns out it’s only purpose is faster curing, it doesn’t change the characteristics of the cured gasket.