Second try at headers

I have determined today that there will be no free lunch for me when it comes to engine swaps.  A few months back I blogged about installation of Doug's Headers that were supposed to be designed to fit an LS1 swap into a '65 Chevelle. For those that don't recall, after a lot of massaging to the pipes I did get them to fit, but they were still very close to the frame rails, the passenger side hit the floorpan, the spark plug wires hit the pipes, and I wasn't sure steering linkage would fit.  The headers were of great quality, I just don't think they were well designed for a '65 swap.  And they were pricey, at least for my budget.

Fortunately/unfortunately I found the Hooker Headers came out with a cast manifold this year designed for LS1 swaps.  It isn't specific for any application, but they claim a tight to the block design to maximize space.  They were cheap relative to Doug's, and come ceramic coated, seemed like a great solution to the problems above. After waiting for a month of backorders, they finally arrived this week. They look like a nice piece, although I was disappointed they didn't come with gaskets.  Not a big deal at $12 from the parts store, but you would think they would include gaskets so you didn't have to run out in the middle of the project.

The first set of headers came out easy enough, thankful since the body is on now and I wasn't sure what space was there.  The new gaskets that came with Doug's Headers split in half, so I had to run out to Autozone to pick up a new set.  Only trouble was scraping off the gasket material.

Lucky for me, the Hooker headers seem to be a great alternative for this swap.  Both sides fit right up with no modifications needed.  I have a couple watchouts for the passenger side; 1) the manifold flange to the catalytic convertor touches the starter soleniod and might over heat it, and 2) the angle is a little steeper down than I would like, more directed towards the firewall rather than the ground would have been better.  Overall I think that we should be able to fit the catalytic convertors in place with a sharp bend on the passenger side.  For the starter I may look to see if any of the F-body starters have the solenoid clocked more towards the block if there is a hot start issue.

Here you can see the clearance to the passenger side frame rail.  A little tight, but better than 1/8" space to the flange, which could be trimmed if absolutely necessary.  I went with the titanium finish since I wasn't sure how chrome would look over cast iron.  I like the subtle look that could fool you into thinking they were stock if you didn't know better.  Hooker claims to have good power out of these, I'm sure not as much as long tube headers, but they fit and will be nice and quiet since they are cast and not tubing.

 The fit on the drivers side is great, with loads of room around everything.  I probably have a good 1" space to anything around the header.  Plus the spark plug wires are no where near hitting the manifold now, so they won't melt.  Very good thing.  And room for catalytic convertors here, so I can pretend I'm being green.

 It's hard to see in this picture, but I wanted to show how the power steering lines up now. The long tube headers looked like they were very close to blocking the path, now you see a clear line of sight from the box back to the opening in the firewall.