Tips for TU header install

[slasky]

I will hopefully be putting my header on later this month along with a new head and intake. I was looking for some tips or suggestions from people that have installed one in their car; especially L body owners.

thanks

[Aries_Turbo]

port match the turbine inlet to the header output.

Brian

[tvanlant]

Mine was a PITA. It took a bunch of grinding on the header and on my 2 piece to get it to bolt to the head without hitting the intake. Make sure you have a spare head to practice fitting the manifolds on. My coolant return wasn't even close to fitting, so I had to make my own braided line.

I had to take out the heater valve by the brake booster, and the inlet tube was still somewhat of a tight fit, but it wasn't too bad.

[slasky]

I have a spare block and head to mock up the header. Any other clearance issues to look out for?

[johnl]

Obviously, the oil supply and drain back and coolant supply and drain back have to be re-engineered/routed. Similarly, you lose whatever elbow you may have had for the compressor outlet.

The oil drain back is an unavoidable issue, Chris supplies an extended and properly bent tube that you can mocked up and tack weld at the turbo's center section's two bolt oil return flange and then remove for finish welding. My first attempt leaked oil because I'm was trying to be pretty instead of good - the leak was in the tight Vee between the flange and the bent tube. On the second round, a big blob of steel fixed that!

Yes, it IS tight where the heater I/O barbs exit the firewall - BUT that depends on the size of your compressor housing. So . . . . . Right now the heater hoses are not hooked up. It does look like two household plumbing 1/2" Ls could be sweated onto those two barbs but I haven't confirmed the exact diameter of the heater barbs . . . . .

I had to die grind clearances/flat spots for exhaust nuts, maybe two, forget which ones.

You might drill and tap for EGT while it's still easy.

[shelbyES]

Put mine on today... was'nt fun at all. The top studs were fine the bottom studs are a pita! I bolted the intake on and then put the studs in for the header. I held the header up and looked at where they touched. Then I used a sharpie to mark the areas that touched together. Got out the die grinder with a pointed carbide and removed enough material till I could get it to sit flush and all the nuts on the bottom. I removed material fom the intake as well.( I removed material from both as to not take too much off one or the other.)

[tmef]

Pretty straight forward, easy install if you ask me. Yes a little grinding needed to be done and the opening had to be port matched to the turbine housing but no big deal. As far as the coolant line needing modified, this should have been no surprise. I mean come on, the turbocharger has been relocated 4-5 inches. BTW, the stainless kit from TU that was designed to be used with the header works perfectly. I also relocated the watervalve forward kinda like in a J body Lebaron. For the exhaust, I cut the downpipe just forward of the very last little bend and it lined up great. Couple of pics enclosed. If you have any other questions I would be glad to help.

[Chris W]

My coolant return wasn't even close to fitting, so I had to make my own braided line.

I had to take out the heater valve by the brake booster, and the inlet tube was still somewhat of a tight fit, but it wasn't too bad.

Tyler, What type of turbo were you running? I have tested our braided steel oil line kits on DBB, hybrids and stock turbos and they all work fine. We also provide a 45 degree angle extension for the coolant supply which needs to be installed like the photo.




.....The top studs were fine the bottom studs are a pita!

I agree. The bottom nuts are a pain because the header needs to be drawn on to the cylinder by slowly tightening each nut.

We did extensive flow testing and when we extended the runners out further not only did we lose firewall clearance in the L-Body but the flow suffered too. I "assumed" that every one was purchasing these manifolds for "performance" reasons, not ease of installation. To us it didn't make sense to reduce performance just to make installs a little less difficult. As always we are here for installation tech support 7 day a week.

Some of the L-Body installation photos include the original SS header version. I included some of them because positioning of coolant lines, heater hoses, etc. is pretty much the same.

Chris-TU

[slasky]

Thanks. My parts are on the way so I should be able to do some test fitting soon.