Looking towards the winter I am thinking of adding Headers to my stock 305. I am thinking of adding the below listed headers. This is what the ad says.

MAC True Fit Header system is made of 1 5/8" 16ga. tubing, complete with a 2.5 Y-pipe and 3" collector.

Anyone with knowledge on this system? Yea or Nea. If Nea where or what should I get. Just looking for improved performance. I don't race the car, just want my engine to breat a little more. The advertisement says 21 hp increase.

I have asked this same question on the exhaust board and they reccomend Hookers or Headmen headers. I am just wondering what TBI motor owners actually have on their cars that they like. Money is not the problem, I just want something really solid that won't leak or sound like crap. I understand I will need good gaskets as well. In reccomendations for those and a Y pipe.

 

Yeah thats a good question , i'm about to order some hedman 1 5/8 set w/ y pipe ....

 

Hooker 2055s are top notch. They are emission legal ones too. Make sure to get ceramic coated (either black or chrome).

 

i asked the same question of slp a couple of years ago, i have a 92 rs tbi and they said if the motor is stock , dont bother with the headers, they will bog the car down, not enough backpressure for the stock motor.

 

i am running edelbrock tes headers. a little pricey but i love them

 

wow talk about a horrible piece of information from slp.

 

QFT

 

SO i was misinformed by SLP.
What's the deal with headers on a basically stock LO3, 5speed ?
Should i get them?
I'm getting a new LO3 long block from chevy to replace the motor on my car. It went bad last week, and the DR. says it's time to replace it. Every one says to put a 350 in it. But for many reasons i cannot do this at this time. money is the biggest concern since i'm getting married in september. She loves the car as much as i do and i can't believe she understands the car is here to stay.
Everything should work out of the box with the LO3.
I'm thinkin of using a performer manifold on the new engine. And the TBI from the old motor. I can't get involved with the reprogram of chips or electrical glitches. Every thing i do in the repair has to be with no mods to the computer. Are the headers computer friendly.
Yes, No, maybe ?
I did up the suspension a few years ago and the car handles quite nice. I'm the original owner, and it is a true 1992 rs heritage package car. I have a custom y pipe that goes into a random tech cat and on to an slp stainless 3" exhaust. I also made it breath better by getting rid of the stock air cleaner and put on a cowl hood.

I've posted on this site before and really didn't get too much help.
Please ,please ,please help me out with some answers.

 

the first choices in short tube headers on a 3rd gen v8,from an experienced point of view
1.Hooker shorties
2.Headman shorties
3.SLP 1-3/4s
LONGTUBES
1.A++++
HOOKER LONGTUBES
the absolute best longtube header on the market
back in the early 90s when summit was the only way to get parts from SLP the guy told us that the 1-3/4 shorties on a stock 5.7 will slow the car down
it would be better to buy the 1-5/8 then switch in the future so we told him we will take the big tubes now,then hooker released the 1-5/8 with a 3"collector i bought them for my car way more affordable

 

Hooker 2055's will not hurt your car at all. You may, and I say may, need a vacuum adjustable fuel pressure regulator from TPS and a gauge in order to bump up your psi by a pound or two.

 

Thanks for the info, but may i ask why i might need this vacuum gauge thing and will it require tweaking the computer?

 

HOLD UP DUDE!!! Have you ever heard of an L05? Its almost identical to an L03 in every respect except that it has 45 more cubes. Look at the stickies at the top about a 350 swap. All you need besides the 350 longblock is an ECM chip out of a caprice with a l05, a ESC module, a knock sensor and some 350 injectors. Your looking at probably 2-300 dollars worth of parts if bought BRAND NEW. Most of them can be found and easily removed at a salvage yard for MUCH cheaper.

The L05 longblock is probably the same price as the L03.

Read this:

https://www.thirdgen.org/forums/tbi/...-350-swap.html

If not you'll be missing a chance to increase your power substantially for only a small extra investment.

 

Mac Headers, 3" highflow cat, 3" catback, better air intake (you could use a stock camaro tpi air intake with a carb hat) and tuned chip made my Trans am lo3 perform surprisingly better then stock.

For exemple before from 80-128mph it took forewer, now fully loaded it pulls easely up to 140 and over. Last vacation my lo3 was pulling 135mph uphill that was impressing.
Acceleration is better too. Only downside it that stupid loud exhaust noise, drive 2x10hours at 2000-3000rpm and you will understand, next time im wearing ear protections.

Overal fuel economy during the last trip of 2500Km=1562.5miles/290L=76.618USgal 20.393miles/1USgallon Air condition was on the whole trip. (1km=1.6miles and 3.785L=1USgal)

Thanks TGO members and animators!!!

I cant wait to install the 94-95 lt1 cam + edelbrock performer intake.

 

1st of all thanks to all who answer me, i know i could use the LO5, but right now even the 2-3 hundred extra and the time it would take to get back on the road is not do able to me right now. Just dont have the time to swap injectors, and computer. Also i dont have the time to do the swap myself so i'm paying the labor. The less involved the better for my pocket.

appreciate the advice though.
What about me using the LO3 with the edlebrock performer manifold and headers, no computer mods required for that. Not gonna do the cam just yet cause it will void the three year -36000 mile warranty.

I just cant justify the extra expense at the moment with my wedding in september, and the car is my daily driver.

As for the headers I would like to keep the air pipes, what about the edlebrock headers with air, any word on those?

 

hmm92,
the upgrades you mention dont require any mod to make your car perfectly drivable, just bolt and go. With a coustom chip you may get a little more out of your upgrades.

Edelbrock work wery well, they are just a little skinny for 300hp engines, but for ours lo3 they work fine.

From reading other treads, the performer manifold is not interesting untill you change cam. But if you have one use it. But if you need to buy one your better off spending that money on the chip, or ceramic coated Mac performance or Hooker headers.

 

I dont think your gonna see enough gains to merit the expense of an edelbrok intake, the headers are a differant story. The GM intake is sufficient for a 305, they work pretty good on mild 350's.

Aftermarket mail-order chips are for the most part a complete waste of money. Read up on them.

A cam is gonna require some chip burning. Just about anything that will make a big change in power, you do to a speed density system your gonna have to re-write the chip to accomadate.

Im telling you, your best route at this point on making more power is a L05.

Injectors are easy to change, about 8 torx bit screws and you can have them out. The ESC you just unplug and plug the new one in. The ECM (if you get a whole unit) is just unplug and replug. The knock sensor screws into a drainage hole at the bottom of the block.

 

I am close to this. I have the tpi air intake and the 3"catback plus the Hi Flow cat, so I needthe chip tunned and the Mac Headers and I would be simular to yours.

 

86niterider,
I was wondering, the 3"catback + hi flow cat + air intake, make a difference from stock?
Also do you use a carb hat connected to the tpi air intake? If so could you post a pic in the "cold air lo3" tread?

 

Edelbrock Performer EGR Intake
LT1 Cam
SLP 1 3/4" Ceramic Coated Headers
Electric Cutout
Ported TBI with injector spacer
14x3 K&N Open Element
55 pph injectors tuned with prominator
Aluminum Driveshaft

216 wheel horsepower, 266 wheel torque and I haven't seen a stock head-ed TBI car dyno higher than that. SLP/Edelbrock will say the car will lose power with larger headers, but as far as I've seen, that couldn't be further from the truth. Closing my cutout (which runs through a 3" Catco Cat and Hooker Aerochamber) lost horsepower across the entire powerband (pull started at ~2000-2500 rpm).

 

I just bought a set of used Hedman Short Headers. 1 5/8th primaries and 3" collectors. Any opinions on them?

 

Yes it did. stock felt sluggish. There was anoticable difference, especially once I switched to cold air tpi.

 

Nice , give me some comments on them when they installed ... Where did u ordered them ?

 

I bought them used on eBay for a total of $96.

 

What's the price differene between the 305 and 350? I HIGHLY doubt the difference is anywhere near the price of headers and an intake.

When you you do the 350 swap you only have to change the injectors and chip to make it drivable. You are looking at less than 200$ if you buy new and you could cut that price in half if you source used parts. If you don't have time to plug a chip into the ecm you don't have time to scratch your *** while you put gas in the car.

Leave the stock exhaust and intake on the car and do the 350 swap. You'll make TWICE as much power and have tons of potential when you have the time and money to add the bolt-ons later on down the road. You can't just swap in 45 cubes in a weekend.

You are missing out on a huge opertunity to upgrade your car.

 

I bought and installed my MAC headers and y-pipe in addition to my already installed 3in pacesetter catback (NO CAT), about 4 1/2 months ago during winter when my car was in storage. The price was pretty salty. But I must admit I have have not had a single problem with them since I installed them. The coating is still on them as good as they were new and I have about 3,500 miles on them. Except for the routine first few retorque's of the header bolts. The only flaw I had with them is one of the headers pipe on the drivers side bent slightly too sharply and I couldn't put the supplied bolt in, so I just cut the bolt to length to get pass the bend and it worked fine. Only about 1/8 of an inch was takin off. And I had to modify my dipstick to work. But honestly I took about 3 hours after school for 3 days and got them finished. It was not bad at all and I greatly recommend them. On my G-tech is droped my times from 14.6 to a 14.2. Much increased power difference in the top end. Great tone and overall great quality. Alright enough of that. Oh and for the guaranteed 21hp in hp increase I believe it is right around in that area, of course with the right tuning and remember its going to vary between cars with more or less performance parts already installed.

Here is my car on youtube with them just installed (the exhaust is not hooked up just straight headers into the supplid MAC 3in y-pipe).
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=sifCwtYZhbw

 

You have to keep the air pipes if your car is registered in an emissions county or state. Otherwise its up to you. I have SLP headers, but I'm sure other brands like Edelbrock & Hooker are just as good....definitely cheaper.

Two things:
First - I'd recommend getting the 1 3/4" headers. Any argument about torque loss due to decreased backpressure is bull. And they'll be a perfit fit if you should ever decide to put in a 350.
Second - Go with a full 3" exhaust for the same reasons I mentioned above. The car will sound really nice

 

That's a nice setup. Details?

 

where did you get that carbhat at?

 

first of all congrats the marriage, marriage can be a wonderful thing. your woman is deffently a keeper, if she supports your camaro. my wife understands this as well, my car is here to stay. marriage, kids( i dont have any yet), ect. none of these things should change what you can drive. my car is my daily driver and my wife loves it as much as i do. i think its cool to share the car with my wife, and in the future my kids. nothing is better than going out to a drive in movie or dinner with my wife and taking my beloved car.

anyways i run edlebrock TES header (ceramic coated), catco cat, and a 3" catback system. headers have smog tubes. i still think it was the best bang for the buck. i paid 500 for the headers (included a Y pipe), 100 bucks for the cat, and 240 bucks for the eldebrock 3" cat back. i can complain their headers are a good quality product. i dont have any experience with the hookers, i sure they are a great products, however they are also 800+. some people complain about the edlebrock Y pipe, i cannot complain. much much better than the stock crap i took off. i vote edlebrock for a good quality/performance mix for the price. if you buy the hookers that are about that price, you get the lesser painted units, not really the best bet for a long term investment. they will rust.

 

I've never heard or read about anyone complaining about their car being slower after putting on headers of any size, whatsoever.

MAYBE if you ONLY changed out the headers on the car, didn't change the y-pipe, didn't even put an open element on there, MAYBE you might not see an increase in power...but even that sounds ridiculous.

in fact, the only two complaints I've heard about headers at all were as follows:

1. the 1 1/2 headers are entirely too small.

2. if you don't get ceramic coated, you'll eventually regret it. everything else rusts eventually, including stainless steel. stainless steel also turns some crazy weird colors after having been used for a bit as well, apparently. not attractive.

so based off of that, make sure you get ceramic coated, try to go for inside/outside jet-hot type dealies if you can, and don't go smaller than 1 5/8's...you may even want to go bigger. oh, and get ones that come with a y-pipe, for the sake of ease of installation, better performance...and the fact that sometimes they also come coated.

and don't cheap out on them. buy them used, that's fine, but if you buy new, don't buy the cheapest ones, usually you regret it due to one of the above complaints.

 

i've got a full Hooker set up on my car from the headers back. I love the way my car sounds. definate increase in power but DAMN I need a tune.