Blown head gasket options

[McMasterJamie]

So I've blown the head gasket! Its always used a bit of water on long drives etc but the other day it started to over heat so parked up then when cold put almost 2 litres in and little bubbles were coming out the header tank anyway.. Me and dad have completely rebuilt a standard legacy ej206/8 engine 3 times so reasonably experienced but not with higher hp builds. Im thinking just take the head off, put in arp head studs, good head gasket (which is best?? what thickness? what bore? ive done a bit of research and theres 93mm and 93.5mm i guess 93.5 is oversized? and how much difference will head gasket make to compression ratio ie, .7mm, 1.0mm etc? V7 STI long block.

 

edited, didn’t over heat, temperature gauge just started to rise slightly before parking up.

[McMasterJamie]

Any thing else in the head worth doing while apart? 

[boostin]

Just a word of warning. If it's been too hot, the alloy goes soft and it's trash. You'll forever have issues with head gaskets etc. Any good engine reconditioners should be able to hardness test them for you. 

[McMasterJamie]

7 minutes ago, boostin said:

Just a word of warning. If it's been too hot, the alloy goes soft and it's trash. You'll forever have issues with head gaskets etc. Any good engine reconditioners should be able to hardness test them for you. 

Yea cheers we have had to do that before on a motor so I do know that process but no this didn’t over heat, I should change my wording to, the temperature gauge started to climb slightly before I parked up.