Honda L15A/LDA3/LEA1 Head Gasket 12251-RB0-004

Honda L15A/LDA3/LEA1 Head Gasket - 12251-RB0-004

Your Fit, Civic Hybrid, CR-Z, Insight, or ILX Hybrid's blowing white smoke, overheating, or you're finding coolant mixed in with your oil? You've got a blown head gasket. Part number 12251-RB0-004 is the OEM multi-layer steel head gasket for L15A, LDA3, and LEA1 engines. The head gasket seals your cylinder head to the block and keeps combustion gases, coolant, and oil where they belong. When it blows, you're getting coolant leaking into the cylinders, oil and coolant mixing together, or compression escaping past the gasket. Any of these means you're tearing the engine down to fix it. Fresh OEM gasket seals everything back up and gets your engine running right.

Here's How They Blow

Head gaskets blow from overheating, detonation, or just age and heat cycling. If you overheated your engine badly, the head warps and the gasket can't seal anymore. Running aggressive timing or boost on a modified L15A without a proper tune? Detonation's hammering the gasket until it gives up. High mileage engines with 150k+ miles can blow the gasket from nothing but years of heat cycles. The gasket compresses and relaxes millions of times and eventually it's done. Once it blows, you're not driving the car anymore. Coolant gets in the cylinders and hydrolocks the motor, or coolant and oil mix and trash your bearings. Stop driving it and pull the head before you turn a blown gasket into a full engine rebuild.

Multi-Layer Steel vs Old Composite Gaskets

This OEM gasket's multi-layer steel, not the composite or graphite stuff from older engines. MLS gaskets are multiple thin layers of stainless steel with embossed sealing beads stamped into them. They're way tougher than composite gaskets and they seal better when you're making high cylinder pressure. The L15A, LDA3, and LEA1 engines use MLS gaskets from the factory and they handle normal operation without problems. They're also more forgiving if your head or block's got minor imperfections. The layers compress and conform to small surface variations. But if your head's seriously warped from overheating, the gasket can't fix that. You need to get the head resurfaced at a machine shop or it's not sealing no matter what gasket you use.

This Job's a Teardown

Head gasket jobs aren't quick. You're either pulling the engine completely or at minimum dropping the head while the block's still in the car. Timing chain's coming off, cams are coming out, head's getting unbolted. Once the head's off, you're scraping both surfaces clean. Any old gasket material left behind and you're leaking. Check the head with a straightedge and feeler gauges. If it's warped more than a couple thousandths, take it to a machine shop for resurfacing. Install the new gasket dry on perfectly clean surfaces. Torque the head bolts in three steps following the factory sequence. You don't want to do this job twice, so use OEM head bolts or quality ARP studs. Don't even think about reusing old head bolts. They're torque-to-yield and they stretch. Reusing them means your new gasket might not seal.

What You Get

• Honda OEM head gasket (part number 12251-RB0-004)
• Multi-layer steel (MLS) construction
• Seals cylinder head to engine block
• Prevents combustion gases, coolant, and oil from mixing
• Same gasket your engine came with from the factory

Fits Your Car

• 2009-2013 Honda Fit
• 2012-2015 Honda Civic Hybrid
• 2011-2016 Honda CR-Z
• 2013-2014 Acura ILX Hybrid
• 2010-2014 Honda Insight

Compatible Engines

• L15A (2009-2013 Fit)
• LDA3 (2010-2014 Insight)
• LEA1 (2011-2016 CR-Z, 2013-2014 ILX Hybrid, 2012-2015 Civic Hybrid)