steel shim head gasket

When I installed steel shim head gaskets on my 273, I took a copper wire and used epoxy to attach it to a groove in the gasket that circled the cylinder bore, overlapping it on the ends a tiny amount. Upon dis-assembly later, the copper wire had crushed perfectly around the bore and seemed to have provided the same benefit as if the block/or head had been grooved for the wire. I found this trick mentioned is a hot rodder's magazine from back in the '70s. Also used the copper coat and retorque as suggested above.