Is this the wrong exhaust gasket?

[KYJ10]

I got an engine rebuild kit from summit. I needed a 76 360 kit. But am putting on a set of 1980 exhaust manifolds. The gaskets they gave me look like you have to cut them out and put each individual piece in each exhasut port. the middle gasket piece is a rectangle with no center piece to seperate the two inner ports. Im assuming that there should be gasket in between the inner two ports. ??????

[joe]

Unless there's some mis-match or warpage I don't see a need for exh man gaskets if the manifolds are flat/true. Neither a 76 nor an 80 360 came stock from the factory w/exh man gaskets.

[Damage, Inc.]

Both of the posts here seem strange to me. I've heard of a no-gasket exhaust, didn't know they did it on the 360.
As for the divider (between 4/6 and 3/5), I'd have to say, from a purely physical view, that it's needed. I've seen engines with odd firing orders where 3/5 and 4/6 fire sequentially, and the lack of divider in that application doesn't result in power loss, but in your 360, I'd have my doubts.

Someone, please correct me if I'm wrong...

[KYJ10]

Well, I called federal mogal, who made this gasket kit for summit. They said that gaskets used to be made with the divider, but they realized it's not needed. Anybody want to second that?

[Damage, Inc.]

Yes, this is interesting. The exhaust gaskets I just put on (Fel-Pro) had the divider...hmmm...

[Sundowner]

my fsm lists no gaskets for the continental 47 states and gaskets for CA. since the CA rigs had cat's I'm going to take a leap of faith and say they were added to seal against the back pressure of the old pellet style cat's. I used the indvidual style gaskets on my 78 (with no cat)

[shadowfax101]

I have never had gaskets last more than 3-4 months, so I took mine off and had the manifold smoothed flat and it has not leaked since.

[madogswagon]

I just replaced my exhaust gaskets and I thought they were the wrong ones but they are CORRECT. A pain in the *** to put on, but correct.

[Crazy_Jeepman]

I would take the Manifolds in and have the surfaces milled flat, and go with out the gaskets, as this is the best bet all the way around. You never have to change whats not there! ;)