Have all the tools necessary to make them, and plus i want to go 1 7/8 instead of the 1.75 that hawks sells. Buy a 1 7/8 headers kit from summit for $120 and the ls1 flanges for $60.

Anyone done this?

 

It's tough, but certainly doable. If you want equal length tubes, that drastically increases difficulty. It takes a lot of time, but if you take your time and do a lot of measuring, you should be fine...provided you are good at welding and fabricating.

When I did mine, all I had was a 3" cutoff wheel and a welder...so they didn't turn out as good as I liked. PLUS, once I welded up all the seams, the tubes slightly warped. For most people that probably wouldn't be a problem. But my clearances are so tight, it was a problem for me. The main thing I wanted was for the collectors to NOT hang below the frame rail. There is tons of room for that...I don't know why Hawks didn't do it.

Here are a couple of pics. They turned out okay...they fit and they work. I'll make another set once I have a little more time and a band saw.

 

Dude if you could learn to tig weld, you could makes some serious money. Make a 1 3/4" header for 500$ and kill hawks on sales lol. Looks good though.

 

I've built several sets, just take your time and always buy more materials than you think you'll need.


If you weld them with a MIG, treat it like sheet metal with lower heat and weld in small patches to avoid warping and blowing holes through.


Also, make sure to test them for leaks before you have them coated...

 

Fast377 i was just looking at your pics on tech lol. What size collector are you running? most of the 1.875" kits come with 3.5" collectors

It doesn't seem too hard i'm a pretty good welder, would just need to work on them all night on the weekends.

I've also found that sbc long tubes will work great if you cut off the sbc flange, make 2 new primaries for the middle 2 cylinders, and weld on the ls flange

 

My collectors are 3"...but now have ball socket flanges stepped down to 2.5". The next set I build will be much nicer.

Quick suggestion on materials. Don't buy a kit. Buy a bunch of donuts and straight sections. Most kits don't have enough bends to make an intricate set of headers.

 

Here is something that maybe interesting

http://www.stainlessheaders.com/headerfabrication

 

I've been studying up on headers AGAIN, and Dyno Don's headers are really good. It seems that long tubes aren't really worth the trouble, for most applications.

Don, himself, is running his own 1 3/4" shorties on his 355, and he's putting down over 400 hp to the wheels. That aint bad at all.

89ROC-Z, sometimes large tubes aren't the answer and will kill torque, especially on a SBC. Are you building a fire breathing drag race engine or a larger displacement like a 396 or 420 or something?

Just saying. I talked to Don, and he has something like 50 years experience with racing and headers and stuff. He's a great guy to talk to about headers, for sure.

On the other hand, I think it is way cool to be able to weld and make headers and stuff. Good stuff.

 

^^he doesn't make ls1 headers