I just came home with a good running 350 that has the dipstick on the driver's side. Now that I have it home it looks like my stock exhaust mainfolds on my 83 trans am will not work with that dipstick location. My question is can I use the older exhaust manifolds on my 83? I have all kinds of older small block manifolds even the rams horn types. What will work? I would rather not buy headers right now.

 

If you don't wanna go with headers, your only options are:

- Use other manifolds, and have the exhaust modified for said manifolds.

- Bend dipstick tube to tightly follow the side of the block/head. There is enough gap between the stock '83 manifold and head/block that you can pinch the dipstick between them, and not crush the tube. This is what I did.

 

Does that mean I can use earlier model exhaust manifolds?
Or the other question is will most headers have room for my dipstick on the drivers side?

 

All sets of headers I've seen should work fine with either dipstick location.

As for other manifolds - some will work, some will not. None other than the stock ones will bolt onto your existing exhaust system though.

 

Thanks for the help. If I buy headers will they bolt up to what I have at the stock location. I have a Dynomax exhaust system now. Thanks for all of your help.

 

Alot of times with headers you will end up making a custom y-pipe for it to fit. I bought a set of Hedman headers with their y-pipe and it clears the dipstick, and the y-pipe was cheaper than what it was going to cost me to have a custom one made.

 

Some general rules of thumb:

A Lokar flexible dipstick is another way to clear stock exhaust manifolds.

Stock exhaust manifolds in general are pretty poor, and will limit the performance of your 350.

Nobody makes headers for our cars that fit the stock y-pipe. But, the factory y-pipes are pretty poor, anyway, and will limit the performance of your 350.

One guy's y-pipe won't fit another guy's headers. So, the best bet is to get headers that have a y-pipe with them (or in the case of certain Hedmans, available).

 

In addition to that brand, SLP and Edelbrock also come with a Y-pipe that will fit their headers to your stock exhaust.

If you're trying to make this thing faster, the VERY FIRST MOD you need to do even to an otherwise stock 305, is to ditch the manifolds. It's beyond pointless to put a bigger motor in there and leave that drinking-straw stuff that constipates a 305 behind it. I'd strongly recommend looking around at headers.

 

Thanks for the help. I do have a Dynomax system on stock exhaust manifolds. The Y pipe looks pretty big (don't know size) it hooks to a very big single pipe going back to the muffler. The driver's side is bolted to the new Y pipe and the pasenger's side has what looks like an older piece of pipe welded to it.

 

If you're going headers, best thing to do is what RB83L69 said, get the y-pipe/header combo, that way it's guaranteed to fit. Most of these y-pipes only go to where the converter (or off road pipe) would start at, and you would then use the cat-back from there.

I think my y-pipe and shorty headers 1 5/8" with 3" collectors ran me around 270 bucks, all I had to do was drill the holes and weld in the O2 bungs myself. The headers came with gaskets and all bolts and hardware to bolt them up, it is an awesome kit and if you don't want to spend the 400+ bucks on the SLP stuff, this is the best way to go.

 

Klortho-thanks a lot. I will do that. Any best sources for header and Y pipe? How about summit?

 

Summit is a good place, but really only have the real expensive header/y-pipe in stock I ended up getting mine from a local shop which after taxes was a few bucks less than Summit and was actually able to get them quicker than Summit by about 2 weeks.

Best thing to do is, goto the header manufactuer site and look for dealers. A few of the best header makers are Hedman, Hooker, SLP, and Edelbrock.

I know for a fact that Hedman has a place to search for dealers since they were the only ones I found that had D-port headers (which I needed for the LT1 swap I am doing). Yes they are painted, but for now on my budget, that was the best route and saved me over 100 bucks which I was able to put toward the fuel lines I needed worse than ceramic coated headers.

 

Another option for your dipstick delima is the oil pan. Back in the 70s the 267 engine used the 305 type exhaust manifold, so gm came out with oil pans with a tube on the side for the dipstick tube to go into instead of the block. I use to have one of those oil pans. I wish I still had it it since I have an older 350 with the tpi exhaust manifolds.
Has anyone seen this type of oil pan?

 

Yes, that was a very common oil pan, for about one year or maybe 2. I still have a 78 El Camino 305 that has that. They did that in the process of the changeover; they changed the exhaust first, which meant that the old arrangement wouldn't work; but they didn't re-tool the block castings until later.

Last I knew, you could still buy that pan and the gauge & tube assy at GM. It fits blocks with the LH dipstick oil pan rail.

 

Ive been looking on ebay for one but cant find any. Im going to run exhaust manifolds for now with an older block. It will be next yr before I build the late modal 350. 78 elcamino. I will keep that in mind if I cant find a used one thanks.

 

I'm not a Summit employee or shareholder or anything, but that statement just doesn't make any sense to me at all. They have or will get most anything you want, and will price match anyone.

 

Ive contacted sellers on ebay for one those oil pans but havnt got anything back yet. Ive only asked about it 2 days ago. If Im persistant I will find one.

 

I didn't mean it that way, the only header/y-pipes that they had, where they could ship immediatly were SLP, Edelbrock, Hookers. The Hedman headers I got they weren't going to be able to ship for almost a month. I ended up going to a local Hedman dealer and got them within a week and less price than what Summit had them for, and they had to come straight from Hedman in California so I call on it taking them that long to get them which is ridiculous.

 

I just found out tonight that the dipstick won't work with a 1970 block. I guess my question is, should I try to seal the hole with something until I can come up with a solution? Is there a chance of stuff getting in there? What would you use to seal it out, that I could remove when I get a fix?

 

my 1983 came with a driver's side dipstick, and when i pulled the engine out and replaced it i put a passenger side dipstick engine in and i have not had any problems with fitment.. other than I just went and bout a new dipstick tube for it so that it was a little more striaght than it was after i bent it by accicent lol