Recently removed the head, removed all the coolant from the cylinders, and have everything soaked down with MMO.

After scraping the underside of the head down with a razor blade, and wiping it down repeatedly with brakekleen, I thought everything was good. I talked with Roy and decided to get a new head gasket and put it all back together.

Then in another thread about a blown head gasket I learned that the cracks can be very minute and hard to see, and that gentleman used a scotchbrite type of wheel on his Dremel to polish the head and found some very fine cracks.

I went to the hardware store and bought some of those for my Dremel. Polished the area around the valves, and pre-chambers and much to my surprise I found 2 cracks on cylinder 3.

Now I'm trying to locate a good head for my block. Locally,(within an hour drive) I have located 2 of them at recyclers. One for $200, and the other for $350. Both sellers guaranty them to be free from cracks. Neither one can verify how many miles are on the engine they come from.

Not sure why one is almost double the price of the other.

When I get my hands on one of them, are there any other things I should have done, other than check for cracks myself, and check for flatness?

I have already ordered the valve guides and seals before I found the cracks on my head. Should I have them replaced now on the new head, just as a precaution?

Thanks for anyone to take the time to give their 2 cents.

Rick