revmatcher
I'm Awesome
A few points on my truck:
- The headers I actually bought are sold out on ebay. The link I had up on GMT400.com died, so I found the closest thing I could. Basically they look exactly the same. The primary tubes on these trucks need to sweep back up high, then come down in a group like a single pipe. The starter, tight frame rails, and steering shaft all take up space.
- I was MOSTLY worried about the geometry of the headers – can they be bolted in without interference? I did have to dent in the vertical portion of the passenger side heat shield. Just one hit with a soft hammer.
- I was NOT worried about any ports on the headers– those can be plugged or added pretty easily. My LT1 motor has NO EGR, and only one O2 sensor. It’s a FAST XFI computer.
- Because my LT1 has D-Port heads, I had to have my eBay headers modified with the proper flanges. I bought the flanges from StainlessHeaders.com. They cost over $300, which is more than the headers. I forgot to add them on my little cost table. This also meant I had to buy 1” header bolts because of the thickness of these flanges.
- The welding time cost more than anything.
- The drivers side header is farther inboard because the motor is shifted towards the passenger side in the frame on these trucks.
- For whatever reason, the driver side header collector came out lower (closer to the floor) than the passenger side. Because of this, I made an offset in the pipe between the cat converter and the crossover (h-pipe). This offset is rolled to push the muffler closer to the driver side frame rail, and up over the cross-members.
- A 3” pipe would have zero clearance above the crossmembers.