Cid

I am trying to change my valve cover gaskets as well as re-sealing the breather covers due to signs of leakage. The valve covers have been removed from the car, but the breather covers won't come off. Strangely, even though the breather covers show signs of small leakage, they are stuck to the valve covers very strongly. Things I've tried to remove them: light scraping with a razor, degreaser, acetone, gasoline, heatgun, pulling (obviously), some taps with a hammer on a plastic putty knife on the joints...It seems insane to me that it would be this difficult. I have checked over the cover a zillion times to make sure there are no screws/bolts left in - there are not. What's really weird to me is that the cover and the breather cover are joined so tightly there can't be much material joining them but it's holding with the force of 20 suns, which begs the question how is it leaking despite being so tough...

Do you guys have any suggestions? The breather covers are supposed to be secured with a sealant of some sort, but whatever this stuff is it's insanely strong. I'm considering getting a rubber mallet and going ham on it, and trying to jam some thin metal in between and try to pry the thing off (reluctant to do this because i don't want to damage anything).

EDIT: One other thing, from the inside I can get to some of the sealant material - it's very rubbery and spongy. I've pulled some off from the inside, it isn't that tough. All the more why I can't understand how it's holding so strongly.

Cid

Breathers are off. I repeat, breathers are off. One of them wasn't too bad, the other was a PITA. I engaged in some rubber mallet action to the breather cover. It didn't really do anything aside from helping me release some measure of frustration and rage. I then moved on to an acetone slow grind. After much acetoning on the lip right above the coil packs, I grabbed a trusty, large flat head screwdriver and used the coil pack ridges to help me get some leverage on the acetoned whatnot. Much rocka-bye-baby and acetoning later, pop went the weasel and I was able to move on to the next stage of cleaning everything up, which took another eternity.

For any weary travelers who stumble upon this post in the search of some much needed advice on this matter: Acetone, screwdriver, go.

Stay safe.