Headers, down pipe and manifold gasket's
Discussion
HI Craig
What year do you have? If it’s an early one then headers can give an increase in HP as your replacing the cast manifold with tubular headers, but the later cars (creampuffs) came with tubular headers as standard and I’ve heard that these cars don’t pick up much HP as your just changing one tuned header for another. For instance on mine I picked up about 40 bhp with bellangers and high flows but that only put me on a par with shoebags ACR with stock items.
As for the fit, the bellangers weren’t that hard to do, each one is in two bits to make it easier to get in and I didn’t have to make any modifications to either the header or the car to get them in, the hard part was getting the old one out with seized bolts on the flex pipe connector, I ended up having to cut it off. Whatever you do, get the stock gaskets and don’t use the bellanger ones, they harden and just fall to bits, believe me I just spent the weekend replacing mine and it was like a jigsaw puzzle putting the bits of gasket back together to check I had it all.
What year do you have? If it’s an early one then headers can give an increase in HP as your replacing the cast manifold with tubular headers, but the later cars (creampuffs) came with tubular headers as standard and I’ve heard that these cars don’t pick up much HP as your just changing one tuned header for another. For instance on mine I picked up about 40 bhp with bellangers and high flows but that only put me on a par with shoebags ACR with stock items.
As for the fit, the bellangers weren’t that hard to do, each one is in two bits to make it easier to get in and I didn’t have to make any modifications to either the header or the car to get them in, the hard part was getting the old one out with seized bolts on the flex pipe connector, I ended up having to cut it off. Whatever you do, get the stock gaskets and don’t use the bellanger ones, they harden and just fall to bits, believe me I just spent the weekend replacing mine and it was like a jigsaw puzzle putting the bits of gasket back together to check I had it all.
swapped the creampuff headers to belangers here for the much better sound, not sure of any HP increase though changing the cats and to a borla catback at the same did make the car feel much more responsive
no problems as yet with the belanger gaskets, been on 5 years, Dave did you torque them down to the correct lbs?
Fitting them is dead simple with the right tools, a ramp, and the knowledge of which other parts to remove, tie back out of the way
no problems as yet with the belanger gaskets, been on 5 years, Dave did you torque them down to the correct lbs?
Fitting them is dead simple with the right tools, a ramp, and the knowledge of which other parts to remove, tie back out of the way
Edited by Viper on Monday 30th July 09:18
Viper said:
Dave did you torque them down to the correct lbs?
Probably not, couldn't get a torque wrench near most of the bolts, so had to do them shade tree redneck style. They had been OK but the car rather overheated during its last MOT when they were doing the emissions test which i think probably was the last straw. They had become rather brittle though and just fell into about 20 bits when i pulled the headers away.
I have a B+B (Billy Boat) system on my car and the sound is superb, Brunters yesterday voted it best sounding car on the circuit.
Parts are a great fit and the X pipe has removed all the drone from the car. The tips are nice.
Got mine from ROE racing and do agree get the original exhaust gaskets the B+B ones are paper and I had to use HT silicon to get a good seal.
Parts are a great fit and the X pipe has removed all the drone from the car. The tips are nice.
Got mine from ROE racing and do agree get the original exhaust gaskets the B+B ones are paper and I had to use HT silicon to get a good seal.
Can't as I found out Borla have stopped making headers.
Cat back system is still OK.
Sound wise the track manager at Brunters came over and said god your car sounds superb which was nice.
Meant to say also that the paper gasket are fun because they are individuals and bloody hard to do after the system is installed should you ever get a blow, me I used them but intend to have a set of factory in stock.
They also blew like a bu**er after fitting so I had to buzz some of them off and use silicon high temp sealer.
Cat back system is still OK.
Sound wise the track manager at Brunters came over and said god your car sounds superb which was nice.
Meant to say also that the paper gasket are fun because they are individuals and bloody hard to do after the system is installed should you ever get a blow, me I used them but intend to have a set of factory in stock.
They also blew like a bu**er after fitting so I had to buzz some of them off and use silicon high temp sealer.
Edited by viper paul on Wednesday 1st August 12:31
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