Building lakes style headers.

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donsrods

Well-known member
Joined
May 11, 2007
Messages
10,476
Location
fort myers florida
I thought this might be of some interest as lots of us like to build our own headers. My Son is building a new set for his 1930 rpu to replace the Sanderson Jaysters he had them custom build a while back. They are great headers but he felt they didn't fit the old timey look of the car so he bought some flanges, u bends, and megaphone cones and is building a new set.

Here is the Sanderson set that he was running:

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And here is the start of the new set he is building.

mymustangstartingtofix009.jpg


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mymustangstartingtofix001-Copy.jpg


He bought some Car Science baffles that will slip into the cones, but he is going to see how loud it is first before he decides to use them.

If this will be helpful to anyone thinking of doing their own, I will take pictures as he goes along to share. He had to build a tool to press into the end of the round tubing to reshape it to the rectangular shape of the flange ports, and I will post a picture of that also.

Don
 
i want to build a set of these for my current "buget build" project ....


so i say "post away"[P

i will be looking in to see what i can learn...;)
 
I'd like to say this is a weekend project, but it isn't. Dan has never built a set of headers before and is taking his time to try to make them flow as smoothly as they can and look right. We just got in from the shop (it's after 3 am) and he basically spent the day getting the front curved pieces welded into the flanges and getting the number 4 tube cut and fitted to the cone.

What complicates this process is that everything goes in different directions and angles. The exhaust ports on the head aim down at an angle and the cones point down and out at different angles than that. Trying to get the tubes to fit is taking him some time, as is cutting the holes in the cones for the tubes to enter. The holes are not round because the tubes come in not straight on, so he has to cut round holes to start, then cut and grind a little at a time until the tube lays at the correct angle.

Tomorrow I should have some more pictures of progress, but right now there isn't much to see. Thanks for following along though. :D

Don
 
3am?! Wow I thought I stayed in the garage late!:D You guys are hard core.[cl

Question for you Don, will the shorter tubes coming off the head effect the performance in any way? I don't know enough about Old's motors, but some other motors I do know would be effected. Just curious...thanks!

-Troy
 
3am?! Wow I thought I stayed in the garage late!:D You guys are hard core.[cl

I'm feeling it today ! :eek: Dan is on vacation this week so we are trying to get in as many hours as we can. He is working on the headers and I am working on my Mustang.

Question for you Don, will the shorter tubes coming off the head effect the performance in any way? I don't know enough about Old's motors, but some other motors I do know would be effected. Just curious...thanks!

-Troy



Good question, Troy. No question the set he is replacing are better performancewise. They are four tubes going into a common collector like most headers are made, and this new set will be not tuned like those. But the hp loss is not enough to worry about in normal driving situations and he will probably never notice any difference.

These are more for looks to fit the style of the car better vs performance. He IS thinking of keeping the old set just in case he decides to race it at the Billetproof Drags next fall, but I think with the 468 Olds traction will be his biggest problem, not backpressure. :D

Don
 
Thanks Don...I know that's true for SBC & BBC, but wasn't sure if a BIG Old's would be effected or not.
Looking good...keep us posted on the progress.

-Troy
 
When I started posting this thread I thought it would be easy to post some pictures and info that might be helpful to someone else thinking of doing a similar project, but I found out there is not really a lot that I could photograph or explain because of the way these things go together. It really is a matter of just fitting one tube after another to make the transistion between the flanges and the cones, and every set of headers is different.

To be honest, this set was a bear to make..........much harder than we ever thought. Even Matt, who we bought the tubes and cones from, and who builds lake headers for a living, said the 455 Olds is one of his least favorites to build because of the angle the exhaust ports exit the heads and how close the number 2 and 3 cylinders are to each other. If Dan's car didn't have some steering box clearance issues on the driver's side we would have been better to just let Matt build them, but without the car in front of him it would have been impossible to make them and make them work. So we had to do it ourselves.

Now, some engines are fairly easy, by comparison, because the ports on the flanges are ROUND, so you simply have to insert the proper size tubing and weld it on (Chevy small block is one of those). But this Olds has rectangular ports, so you have to reshape the ends of each tube from round to rectangular and that is where the fun began. :eek: I guess you could use a body hammer and an anvil and reshape the ends, but Dan made a tool that is like a rectangular shaped pyramid and by inserting that into the end of the tube and pressing it in under force the end will reshape from round to square.

Here is a picture of that tool. He made it from 4 pieces of flat stock, welded together, then ground smooth so it will slide into each tube without catching. It took him a while to make the tool but we could not have reshaped the tubes without it and without my hydraulic press.

dansheaders001.jpg


Now, to complicate things even more, the tubes do not go straight into the flanges but have to angle up because the exhaust ports aim down at an angle. So we had to form the rectangular portion on an angle, causing us to have to put the tool on the correct angle on the press and then shove the tube down over the tool on that angle. (Hope that makes sense) Here is a picture of how we leaned the base of the press on an angle and then pressed the tube down over the tool.

dansheaders007.jpg


As you pump the handle the tube is forced over that pyramid shaped tool and it deforms into a rectangular shape.


This is going to take a few posts, so please bear with me.:D

Don
 
That was only the beginning of the reshaping process. Next Dan had to move to the bench and slip the tube over a piece of 1.5 x 1.5 box tubing that was clamped to the bench and he used a body hammer to further reshape the rectangular end so it fit snuggly into the flange. It sounds easy but he would have to shape it a little, then try it, then reshape some more and try it again. After a while the tube would finally fit well enough and then we could move on to the other end of that tube so it would slip into the cone .

We found out there are a few ways to weld each tube to the cone. One way is to punch a hole the same size as the tube, slip the tube slightly into the cone, and then weld around each tube to secure it to the tube. The second way is to "cope" the end of each tube so that it really doesn't enter the cone, but just sits flush against the outside and then you weld all around the perimeter of it (after you cut a hole in the cone so exhaust can get through).

We looked up inside the Sanderson Limefire headers I have on my 27 and we saw that they cut the hole and slid each tube through the cone then welded it up. That is what we decided to do on this new set. But to complicate things, the hole does NOT end up being round, like the tube. It gets back to the angles we were talking about earlier. The cones are not sqaure to the engine, they are angled out and pointed down, so the holes end up being an oval shape instead. This took a lot of time because Dan first had to figure out exactly where each tube would enter the cone, then first cut a round hole, and then keep grinding a little at a time until the oval shape was just perfect so the tube would slip in and not bind.

We were going to use a holesaw for the initial cuts on each hole but we were afraid it would grab and bend up the cone. So Dan marked the area to be cut out and then drilled four little holes around the perimeter of it and then used an air saw to cut each hole. Then he used a drum sanding disc on a die grinder to oval out the hole to the right shape. Here is the cone after all that was done.

dansheaders009.jpg


Those 3 holes are for the number 2 -3-and 4 tubes to fit into. Number one goes into the small end of the cone.

Once we had the number one curved tube cut and the number 4 straight tube cut we loosely assembled the header to see how it would look and if we liked it that way. Here is what that looked like.

dansheaders003.jpg


You will notice that in the picture above only the number 1 and 4 holes are present. It is impossible to cut all four holes at one time because you have no way of knowing where they will actually end up, so it is best to cut one hole at a time and make that tube fit well before you move onto the next tube. The picture I posted of the cone with all the holes cut was the end result after fitting each of the tubes.

To get the tubes to enter on the same plane takes some doing. We ran blue masking tape in a straight line to give us a reference mark so we could cut the number 2 and 3 holes at the same level. The odd shape of the cone makes it really tough to know where a straight line is, so it took us some figuring and time to get it right.

dansheaders006.jpg


I could not type enough words to explain how much work it took for Dan to be able to scribe that mark on the cone for the number 2 hole. He made a dummy tube that was coped so it would lay on the outside of the cone and that was a perfectly straight shot to the exhaust port on the flange. It entailed lots of measuring ,some paint sticks cut to shape as a guide, and some guessing. It just takes a lot of calculating because once the holes are cut it it too late to turn back.

I have to stress here that NOTHING will be welded until all the tubes are cut and fitted perfectly. We literally had these together and apart 100 times, making little adjustments in the fit until we had it where we liked it.
 
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One suggestion that Matt made was to not butt the number 2 and 3 tubes too close together at the cone. He said he spreads them apart about 5/8 of an inch so he can get a good weld around each tube and in between them. The Olds engine is unique in that the 2 and 3 ports are right next to each other at the flange, so to do what Matt suggested it causes the 2 and 3 tubes to run slightly at an odd angle to each other which isn't exactly the prettiest way to put them, but necessary to get a good leakfree weld around those two tubes.

In the pictures below you will see how the header looks with all four tubes loosely in place, and how the number 2 and 3 are slightly spread apart as they enter the cone. Sometimes you have to sacrifice asthetics for function and this is one of those times.

dansheaders013.jpg



And here is the view from the back.

dansheaders014.jpg


So today all we have to do is make up the number 2 and 3 tubes for the drivers side, cut the holes for those in the cone, fit them up, and then start welding the whole thing up. Dan is going to tack weld the tubes to the flanges and cones on the car, then move to the welding table to finish up the welding.

I'll post a few more pictures after they are welded up. He is going to have them coated but since Billetproof is about 3 weeks away he will have to just paint them for that show and then send them off to be coated later on.

Sorry that this thread didn't include step by step info but it is impossible to do that since every car and header will be different. The ones on my sbf in my 27 are simple compared to these, as the tubes come straight off of the heads and are spread apart further. But at least this will hopefully give anyone thinking of doing a set some idea of what is involved.

Don
 

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