Hello all, I have not posted in a while, I have been out trying to earn back the cash we spent on our hotrod shopping cart.
We have been upgrading parts as time and cash allows, the next part on our list is swapping the bruised and battered ceramic coated headers with a pair of stainless steel pipes. The rest of the exhaust is now polished stainless and it makes the ceramic look worse. The entire exhaust and drivetrain is visible so we like to keep things clean and bright.
My question: is there an American manufacturer who makes polished long tube headers for a Chevy small block? I think the set we have was originally on a Chevelle. Hooker makes a "vibrator" polished set (but I am not sure if those are made here). I know there are custom header makers, but i can't drop $2500 on a pair of headers.
I haven'ttalked to him in a while but Dan Ferraro at Clear Image Automotive in Washington state was building two different grades of stainless long tube headers...don't know about polished or price. His phone number is 425-251-0329.
Sanderson MIGHT still be made here; not sure though. Stainless headers are great but you'll be polishing them a lot. Id probably opt for a coated set that you can buff to a relatively high luster. You can probably get yours re-coated with a "stainless-like" finish that can be polished to a polished aluminum like appearance.
Whoever built your shopping basket, can probably re-create those headers from a box of stainless tubing on the cheap.
Checked out Sanderson, they are still made in the US. They offer coated, but not stainless. There coated might work out OK for our use though.
I wondering how far down the tubes this discoloration appears for stainless. We need to polish all the aluminum for every event, so we would just add the headers to the prep list.
We built the frame ourselves, but I don't think we have the skills for the header tube bending.
If you're considering ceramic coated, maybe you ought to consider having the existing headers re-coated? It would be the most reasonable, and you already know they fit.
Excellent suggestion on the recoat. I had not thought about that. JetHot has a polished ceramic coat that looks close enough to polished stainless for us. They even do some sweet-looking two color effects. I am getting a quote on getting our's recoated.
There are other places that do this work. Tech Line Coatings may have an authorized distributor in your area. Ideally you want them coated inside and outside to prevent them from rusting from the inside out. FYI; its really ceramic LOL If you drop one...it sounds like you broke your favorite coffee mug, except it costs about 50 times as much to replace it ain:
This is an older thread, you may not receive a response, and could be reviving an old thread. Please consider creating a new thread.
Related Threads
?
?
?
?
?
Hot Rod Forum
2.2M posts
175.6K members
Since 2001
A forum community dedicated to hot rod owners and enthusiasts. Come join the discussion about restoration, builds, performance, modifications, classifieds, troubleshooting, maintenance, and more!