I have a 95 TA and one of the main things I want to do to my car is handling. I heard that long-tube headers are the way to go for power, but have some ground clearance issues. Is the difference in power from mid-length headers worth the trouble, if not, what type of headers do you guys recommend for lowering a daily driver car with coil-overs?

 

With Eibach Pro-Kit (1.25" drop) and Hooker shorties, i'm still hitting the cat or something on the downslope of speedbumps unless i go like 1mph.

there's already dents in the 3" inlet of the cat and the cat itself. i think the flange between the y-pipe and cat is the lowest point, about 3.5" off the ground.

for long tubes, i can't imagine. people on this board have said they can't go anywhere w/ speed bumps or steep driveways w/ Prokit and Hooker long tubes.

when the day comes that i go to cam/heads, i will also go to longtubes and will have to change springs also.

 

Thanks for the reply, turns out I have to replace a few synchros and bearings in my M6 so no long-tubes for me till summer.

 

I would stay away from LT's if you ever plan on lowering the car. I'm still at stock ride heights and my Hooker LT's scrape on most speedbumps unless I take them very slowly and at an angle.

If I had to do it all over again I would have bought a set of mid-lengths like the AS&M headers. I really doubt there's noticable HP difference between them and LT's but its terribly obvious when you're scraping your $800+ exhaust system on the ground.

 

I made 411 RW with shorty SLP headers, according to the math I've seen long tubes are for torque more than HP. I wouldn't recommend going for high power in a road car anyway, get wheels/tires first, big, as big as you can reasonably go even if they are track only, 17x9" as your starting point minimum if your TA isn't already a 9" wide wheel.

I'd go with shorties, LT1 tech may be better for finding which headers hang needlessly or not. A cat is going to be a little beefier than an offroad pipe, and MAC has a removable CAT/offroad pipe setup that would probably be quite nice.

 

I too use Eibach Pro-Kit springs. My ride height is 26.0" level floor to fender peak (front) and 26.25" level floor to fender peak (rear). I use jet-hot coated JBA mid-length headers with jet-hot coated Y-pipe, Random Cat & Borla Exhaust.

I still scrape the hollow cat on some speed bumps (slow speed).

I recently purchased a Spohn Torque- Arm and actually considered their long-tube header version. However, one look under the car, reminded me that there is absolutely no clearance for LT Spohn crossmember (less than 2.5" ground clearance) and there is certainly no room to route LT headers. Clearance for headers would also be around 2.5" under the driver's floorpan.

Stay away from LTs if you ever plan to lower your car! An extra 5-10hp is not worth having to stop for every bump and manhole in the road.

 

I have Edelbrock headers and Eibach Sportlines and don't have any issues with the headers not clearing speed bumps & etc.

 

MAC's and my Suspension Tech lowering springs are OK, the CAT flanges do NOT like speed bumps though. Otherwise MAC's are OK

 

I have had very good luck with JBA shorty headers on LT1 4th gens. They fit well, don't effect ground clearance, and flow plenty for a street car.
I have in house dynos of a '95 with CNC heads/ (smogger)cam and the JBA headers pulling 408RWHP.

 

Lowend, can/will you reveal cam specs? There are some california people running a 230/238 I think Ultradyne but nobody has smogged with it yet, its on a 112lsa by default and I dont know overlap offhand. Isky has a 225/234 that I considered though also.

 

I haven't seen this first hand, but I hear the Dynatech LTs have much better ground clearance than Hooker LTs. The FLP headers use the Dynatech tubes and just complete the kit with a downpipe with cats.

Dr. Mudge, you can figure out the overlap if you know the duration and lobe separation. The formula is (Duration/2)-LobeSep = Overlap. Since you're talking about a split duration cam, just take the average duration, which in this case would be 234 deg. Your overlap at .050" tappet lift would be 5 degrees. If you know the duration at .004" or .006", whichever Ultradyne rates their cams at, you can figure out the overlap at that tappet lift also.

 

I know my own cam, similar to the 306, had alot more overlap than that and there was no way it was passing smog without serious 'hacking.'

 

Dr.Mudge
I generally don't reveal much about my combos on the web - but I like you guys
The cam is a 218/218 @050 .525 lift 116LS (4 deg adv)-
frankly I was shocked when I saw the dyno results from the combo. I didn't expect this tiny cam to make so much power, but here we are. I attribute the power to the heads more than anything, they flow ~280cfm by the time we are done with em

I have used a similar Isky cam with 225/230 @050 and 113LS (custom grind) forget smog, but it ran like a bat outta hell in a 396 we built a few months ago.

 

I've got FLP's w/ GC's on all 4 corners sitting @ 26" all around w/out any clearance issuses. Been at the Nurnburgring w/ it and for folks that have been there you'd know what I'm talking about. Not a scrape the whole length of the track. Granted I take speed bumps at a angle but I do that w/ any car so it's no big adjustment for me. You can do it but most don't recommend it thats all.

 

Think about how low you want to go, and speed bumps in your area. Ultimately I'd go coil over if your really going to drive this car on a track, the adjustability is nice regardless, along with being able to pick your springs.

In my area speed bumps are not too bad, however I go 40 miles to another town to pick something up and they are VERY bad. I never checked (slipped my mind) but I ground so hard over one speed bump I felt sure it was my subframe connector, that shook the whole car. I have put a ding or two in the exaust, and scraped off the heat sheilding I had over my pipe on the first day it was on there, there went ~$30.