Well I finally decided to give header wrap a try. I know that there are plenty of header wrap haters out there so I will briefly state my belief. We have all seen a picture of a header on the internet that looks like swiss cheese after the header wrap was removed and what we don't hear is the header's life story. Most of the time when you inquire about the history of the swiss cheese header it was on some type of circle track or racing circuit car or the owner had a set of rusting headers that he decided to do nothing about the rust and wrap them to make them appear in good shape or the headers were made out of some very thin walled tubing. None of those examples apply to any of my driving or usage scenarios. I drive the car on nice days in the warmer months, I Autocross when I find the time(Most AX courses are 2.5-4 mins with plenty of cooling of time), the headers are not thin walled and are/were not rusted. So I personally feel comfortable using header wrap for my scenarios. IF in the occasion that I am wrong at least I will have a clear perspective and findings on this and can step up to stainless steel headers.

I have a set of Hooker long tube 2210 headers and finally had it with melted wire loom, burned/melted wire insulation and burnt spark plug wires. (If you aren't familiar with Hooker's or any other longtubes out there let me just tell you they take up a lot more room than a shorty header and are closer to brake lines, spark plug wires and random ecm/starter wires) I came upon DEI's new Titanium header wrap and looked up reviews, not many were found but most were positive. I decided to give them a shot!

DEI calls it Titanium however after reading about it it is said to be made form lava rock. I guess they just call it Titanium because it looks like it might be Titanium?

DEI's Titanium header wrap is different than their fiberglass wrap and in my opinion easier to work with. This line up requires no glue tape, no soaking the wrap in water and no spraying the wrap with whatever rattle can stuff they want to recommend. You simply wrap it around the header and fasten it with some stainless steel zip style ties. The wrap bends very easily, it is just like working with a thick cloth. The wrap cuts fairly easily and you can use a pair of good sharp scissors. The wrap is woven together and you do need to take caution in that you do not fray the sides. You can use your bare hands when wrapping and handling the headers, you will not get itchy hands since it is not fiberglass!

I had trouble finding out how much of this stuff I actually needed to wrap a pair of Long tubes. I bought the largest roll they made to make sure I would be safe, 100 feet. I ended up using 75 feet total, both sides. If I had a pair of shorty headers I could have gotten away with 50 total. The longest and worst part was sitting there pulling the header wrap through between the primary tubes. The next longest part was figuring out my plan of attack as to how I would wrap them. I am attaching pictures that should explain well enough to any future reader how I did it.

I do feel that I need to tell any member reading this that if you are going to do this be sure to get your wrap from Summit or another online dealer. I checked out Advanced Auto and AutoZone and their prices were $1.40-1.50 per foot Vs $0.80 per foot. Big price difference.

One downfall for me (not the fault of DEI) was that the large primaries (1.75") coupled with turns causes Hooker to put dents in the sides of some of the primaries. This effectively prohibits you from wrapping the tube all of the way to the header's flange. If you did try to, you will not be able to get certain bolts in. On some primaries it was a distance of 3/4" and on others it was more pronounced at almost 2" before you can start wrapping.

Did the Exhaust wrap help under hood temperatures? Yes. Did the wrap help prevent more burns? Yes. Do I recommend this wrap? Yes.

 

Two more pictures:

 

How well has the wrap held up? I'm assuming you've got some miles/heat cycles on it by now. Getting ready to order some wrap for my headers.

 

I have surface rusted edelbrock shorties that I want to wrap.. I guess it can't hurt anymore than they are now lol... I only drive 2000 miles a year in summer months, no rain or snow, or dirt road, etc. No leaking oil either so no chance of fire.. Can this be done on the car??

 

Its held up fine so far, lots of city traffic and a dyno session. No fraying or discoloration or unravelling.

 

i used this stuff on my hedman shorty headers. works really well to block the heat. the metal zip ties didn't work for me, so i bought some stainless steel band clamps. I have nothing but good things to say about this wrap. really good stuff!

 

Good to hear the positive reviews. Looks like I''ll be adding a roll to my Summit order.


While I'm sure it's possible to wrap them while on the car, it'd probably be way easier to do it with the headers off. The amount of time/effort required to pull the headers offsets the time/effort required to do it while working in the limited room of the engine bay. Plus I don't like bending over that far for that long either.

 

True it would probably save time to take em off and do it right. Is it safe to wrap it all the way up to the cat (but obviously not wrapping the cat)

 

I see no reason as to why it wouldn't be safe. I personally wouldn't wrap past the firewall because that would do nothing for underhood temps. Do higher exhaust temps help the cats?

 

I think higher exhaust temps would help the cat actually heat up.. I don't have AIR anymore so I was wondering about that too... Also, wrapping the ypipe might make less heat radiate underneath the floor pan / tranny tunnel (It's not directly under it but close by) so that might help further reduce temps there as well maybe.

 

Just an update, Its been four years since I installed the header wrap and it has held up fine. The wrap never started to unravel, fray loosen, stain or discolor. My headers have not rusted out.

 

Good to hear.

 

What are your thoughts on wrapping stainless steel SLP headers?

 

Nice.

 

If you feel they are putting out too much heat then yeah, go ahead and wrap them. 50' of wrap should be plenty. Buy the stainless "zip ties" at Harbor freight, they are the cheapest I have seen. I'm actually switching to a pair of Stainless Works eBay knockoffs now.

 

i too have a set of mild steel headers that have been wrapped for apprx 3 years now without any issues.

 

Yeah, but I read that you are not supposed to use wrap on SS exhaust components.
I really don't want to pay the price for a ceramic coating, but I MUST reduce the under hood heat. And I don't believe that ANY spray can coating will hold up.

 

One of the reasons I started this thread and updated it was to try to answer the question of "will header wrap turn my header into dust?" You can search the internet and find any answer you want on this. If we were talking about wrapping thin stainless on a turbo charged race engine where all it sees is WOT then yeah, the wrap might heat treat the metal to the point where it is as fragile as glass. But when we are talking about street driven cars I don't think it could give you an issue.

 

cool I just wrapped my hooker 2055s with the same stuff 4 months ago. Good to hear

 

I have seen a few examples of daily driver use of header wrap in desert areas. Long-term, it's a good way to junk a set of headers / y-pipe. Ceramic is where it's at; it is better at underhood temp reduction.

 

Ceramic coating is NOT better at reducing underhood temperatures. It isn't even close. Header wrap is hands down the best way to reduce radiated heat into the engine bay. Ceramic is a very distant second.

 

What bout wrapping old rusty edelbrock headers? Potential for damage or just wrap em and call it a day? lol

 

Go for it! They're old rusted headers anyway, not much to lose

 

hahaha like the way you think !

If oil leaks on these, any chance of fire? That was one concern.