hey jae, about the washer, you can "technically" use a washer, but, if you do it,  remeber that the washer is displaing more torque across a larger surface area and there fore requires more torque.. and if u dont get the torque right ur gunna warp the head, and ull be fuct again.. thats whay all mechaincs that do this work on the 95/96 420a (those r the yrs that had this prob) cut 2 mm off the bolt, b/c using factory torque specs/sequence is very important in the head. if u do a HG chop 2mm off, and get a MLS gasket, not that composite crap, they stoped using composite in 97 b/c well. it sucked and blew esier then the MLS

Common problem.  I guess that knowledge had been lost to a lot of people since it's also a known solution as well for many a year.  We'll have to try and figure out what else that are known solutions that have been lost.