Which would you rather have under your hood?




'94 JBA Headers Install (but it's similar for all years)
I ordered the JBA '93/'94 3.0L Headers from James Duff, and found out from the sales rep that they can get those ceramic coated.  So, I plopped down a rather ridiculous sum of cash and waited.  A week later I get a call from John at JD.  It turns out the $200 extra for the ceramic coat just does the short tube headers and not the Y-Pipe.  The "Y" is still polished nickel plate (ICK!).
So, I called JBA for a "WTF", and it turns out that they only ceramic coat the headers because "their testing" showed that that was all that NEEDED to be done.  I said "sure, but don't they look like hell?"  ...no answer
After going back and forth, JD cut me a $125 break and shipped me the headers as-is.  

Now, the Y-Pipe (Below) was scuffed (that is why they are a little hazy), and painted with Eastwood's "Satin Black High Temp Coating" and they look almost identical to the headers.




After I logged a few miles on them, I retorqued them and they have been just fine.  No strange noises or leaks and there are no problems stemming from the O2 sensors.

I would put these on the "must have" list.

Part numbers:
'91 - '94 "Round" EGR: 1646
'94 "Flat" EGR: 1646-2
'95 - '97 "ALL" EGR: 1646-1
'98 -'03 with EGR: 1647
'98 - '03 w/o EGR: 1647-1
For Ceramic Coating add "JS" to the part number.

From the RPS Boards:
farmer
Moderator


This is standard for the industry. If you want the y pipe coated you have to pay extra. A bummer, but reality. Need is a relative word. The Y pipe is down lower for the most part and so dumps less heat into the engine compartment. In addtion they don't seem to wear out like headers and tail pipes from corrosion. My guess is the temp are high enough to prevent coorosion, and low enough to survive oxidation .... depending on application. Now with a supercharger... You may need to have them coated. For me that is a short trip down the road ... scarcely 2 miles out of my way on the way to work. Not sure what your time to coat and hassle factor is. The price is well .... not cheap.
The paint will be helpful, but don't rely on it long term. It is not a reliable method of protecting steel from burn out. There are several coatings that work well. Aluminum at lower temps. Ceramic at all temps is the premium coating.

Thanks for the heads up.

Farmer

Jorge
Member


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Originally posted by BOSS 3.0:

"THe "Y" is still polished nickel plate (ICK!)."
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Hey, I liked mine in polished nickel plate! I'll be down this weekend to check out your progress.

flaminranger
Member


well Jorge, i hope you don't think that the polish nickel is going to be there forever, those JBA headers get hot as sh!t, i put mine on about a month or so ago, and they are looking rough, they are still a little shinny but i don't care if they where sh!t brown, THEY ARE TOTALLY WORTH THE MONEY!

I wish everybody can read this, this phrase is one of the best you can hear if you are in the automobles.

"CROME DON'T GET YOU HOME!"

and its true, crome heats up and will look like **** in a year

Jorge
Member


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Originally posted by flaminranger:

"
well Jorge, i hope you don't think that the polish nickel is going to be there forever, those JBA headers get hot as sh!t, i put mine on about a month or so ago, and they are looking rough, they are still a little shinny but i don't care if they where sh!t brown, THEY ARE TOTALLY WORTH THE MONEY!

I wish everybody can read this, this phrase is one of the best you can hear if you are in the automobles.

"CROME DON'T GET YOU HOME!"

and its true, crome heats up and will look like **** in a year

"

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No ****!
I've had my headers since September of 1999, and they are far from the condition they were in when new.

farmer
Moderator


A highly polished ceramic coat can be the color of chrome and will not discolor with age. It also dumps less radiant heat into the engine compartment.

The aluminized option will not work for the header itself ... tried that. It bakes off in about 2 years. Too hot for it.

Farmer

BOSS 3.0 [Me]
Moderator


$695 out the door. The $125 was because they were as surprized as I was at the nickel plated "Y"-Pipe. Now that they are the wiser, the price will still be $675. You will know in advance that it "comes with a free jar of vaseline" (to quote RockRanger).

Install was messy at best. Between the Ultra Copper and the anti-seize, I have some cleaning to do before I fire this thing up!

Not a "novice" task either. This is a "some experience/special tools required" kind of thing. While it can be done (with copious amounts of "super penetrant" on the hardware), the potential for disaster is high. Just one broken bolt and you are hosed.

Driverside MUST come up from the bottom, passenger can go down from the top. "Y"-Pipe is tough to position at first because it is a 2 piece. Some juggling at first, but it fits well. Definately a 6 hour-1 man job.

Two people will speed it up a little, maybe 5 hours.
Looks SWEEET! Can't wait to hear it (late this week?).

C-Dog and I couldn't hook up to check the '98 and later clearance issues, but I see what the problem is. On both sides, the header comes within an inch of the FRAME RAILS. There is 2" between the linkage and the header. There is no way these will fit on the driverside of a '98+, but, if you had someone that could fab/bend one...

102° was the unofficial high (98° on the news), that made it a little tougher. Gotta love El Paso, first week of summer and we are in triple digits!


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