Writeups - Summit Racing Shorty Headers
I bought a set of Summit Shorty
headers about a year ago and they have been hanging on the wall of my
garage since then. I decided today is the day to install them. I figured
I could do it in an hour or two. I thought wrong.
Tools used:
I'll add them when done.
Stuff to have on hand:
Rust Remover
Well I didn't start until around
2:00 pm so that was a bad idea right there. I'm going on a trip to
Calico with a bunch of other Bronco drivers next weekend so I have to
finish it tomorrow.
I started by spraying every bolt I could see with a good
amount of Rust Free and let the whole thing have a good soak. The last
thing I want to do is break a bolt on the exhaust manifold. After I let
it sit a while I removed the 16mm bolts where the Y pipe meets the
manifolds. I had removed them before so they weren't to hard to remove.
I then pulled
the spark plug wires and taped the number order on them so I
wouldn't get them mixed up when reattaching them. I then started backing
off all the bolts. The drivers side came off pretty easy.
After I had the bolts out I pulled out the manifold. I don't
know how this thing did not have an exhaust leak before since there were
no gaskets between the manifold and the heads.
I started the two end bolts then slipped the gasket in
place. I then started the rest of the bolts and turned them as far as
possible by hand. The bad thing is with the design of the headers there
is very little room between the bolt holes and the pipes. This means you
can't fit a socket over the 7/16" bolts. You have to use an open end
wrench and turn between 1/8 and 1/16 of a turn at a time. Still it only
took me about 15 minutes to change out the drivers side header.
Now the fun began. I knew from other write-ups that the
passenger side is a real bear compared to the drivers side. The fuel
injection system hangs to the right side of the engine and all the smog
crap is in the way. You would think having a lifted truck would make
this easier from underneath, but not really. The Y pipe meets there and
they're is just no room to reach up and do much to reach the back
two bolts. There is also the EGR valve attached to the manifold that is
one more thing in the way.
It took me about an hour to wrestle out the old manifold and
again there was not gasket. At least I didn't have to scrape one off. I
spent another hour going up and down trying to get the end bolts started
so I could drop in the gasket. I ended up having to start the front bolt
and installing one in the middle and snug it up so I could just reach in
and get the back one started from beneath. I then backed out the middle
bolt and dropped in the gasket. I got all the bolts snug except for that
damn back one then, with the back one only 1/2 way in but tight against
the pipe I could not budge it. I could get a wrench on it but couldn't
get the room to turn it.
What I need to do now is back off all the other bolts so I
can move the header forward enough to tighten the back bolt, then
retighten all the other bolts. I got dark really fast with the cloud
moving in so I decide to call it a night. Not 5 minutes after I moved
the tolls in the house it started raining. At least I didn't get wet.
1/28/06 I guess I never updated this write-up. I will have to do it
soon. But in short I have to get my Bronco smogged soon and I was
getting a exhaust leak. I got lucky and it was just the Y-pipe had
worked itself loose. I managed to partially melt a couple spark plug
wires an before I put a new set I bought on I need some exhaust wrap.
Most auto parts stores won't have this so you need to got to a place
like Summit or in my case I'm kind of lucky since PAW is only about 20
minutes away. I don't like the look of the off white bandage wrap so I
also picked up a can of high temp flat black to go with it. The
directions say it helps to seal and protect them so I guess it's a good
thing.
This is one PITA job doing it on the truck. It would be more of one to
remove the headers first so I started wrapping them up. The directions
let you know how long to cut each piece first. In the case of the front
one on the drivers side, it's 1 1/2" and just over a foot long. With one
bend it calls for 86" of wrap. That's over 7 feet. Sure enough it was
just the right length. I took many breaks since the bending over the
fender to wrap these is hard on the back and knees.
The passenger side was much more fun. First thing I did was pull all the
smog stuff so I could get to it. I also had to do each pipe in multiple
pieces since the pipe were so tight I couldn't slip the wrap between
them. The back one was the most fun. Try not only wrapping it one handed
by touch only but then installing a zip tie the same way. I also wrapped
the EGR tube while I was at it.
I
will have to let them dry and next week I will paint them and button it
up so I can get the Beater smogged.
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