Patent ID: 7806416

Claim:
An at least substantially metallic cylinder head gasket with a gasket plate having two main surfaces and comprising at least one sheet steel layer and at least one through-opening, which, for sealing around the through-opening, is enclosed by a ring-shaped sealing element comprising an elastic metallic sealing strand continuously enclosing said through-opening and having a longitudinal center axis and being pressed when the cylinder head gasket is installed between engine component sealing surfaces, said sealing element being shaped and integrally joined to said sheet steel layer so that at least sections of the sealing strand are elastically tiltable about its longitudinal center axis and so that during said tilting a restoring moment is built up as a result of a spring-elastic deformation of the sealing element about said longitudinal center axis, wherein the sealing element is held in the cylinder head gasket by flexible holding elements which are formed by said sheet steel layer, have the form of a web or tongue, extend transversely outwardly from the sealing element and are at least substantially unpressed when the cylinder gasket is installed, and wherein said sheet steel layer has openings at the outer circumference of the combustion chamber sealing element and between said holding elements so that the holding elements are arranged in spaced relation to one another along the circumference of the sealing element, wherein at the sides of said sealing element facing the two main surfaces of the gasket plate, in cross section perpendicular to the longitudinal center axis of the sealing strand, the sealing element is at each of said sides of such spherical shape as to result in only one first contact surface of the sealing element that faces one of said main surfaces of the gasket plate and in only one second contact surface of the sealing element that faces the other one of said main surfaces of the gasket plate, each of said contact surfaces being convex around the combustion chamber through-opening also when the gasket is installed and pressed and having a crest continuously enclosing said through-opening, wherein, in the unpressed state of the cylinder head gasket, these crests of said sealing element, in cross section perpendicular to the longitudinal center axis of the sealing strand, are laterally offset from one another in the direction of a gasket plane defined by the gasket plate so that the spacing of planes running parallel to the gasket plane and tangentially to the convex surfaces of the sealing element varies when these convex surfaces tilt about the longitudinal center axis of the sealing strand.