James Rear Mount Equal Length Tubular Headers - Test fitted to car

Re: Tubular Headers to keep turbo in stock location

Its Right hand Drive! Opposite land. Shit swirls backwards. Crazy.

Re: Tubular Headers to keep turbo in stock location

in that picture if you look closely you can see the oil feed pipe and return line for the turbo. That manifold is left side manifold on the left side head> its all meant to be like that

turbo will sit in the same position but under that manifold you guys will see how it all works once i build the crossover pipe and buy some more flanges & pipe

Re: Tubular Headers to keep turbo in stock location

Built most of the other side header, had to tweak it around quite a lot to clear the brake master cylinder.

Re: Tubular Headers to keep turbo in stock location

I don't want to be the guy with negative things to say, cause I think what you are doing is awesome! HOWEVER, You are going to have to do some massive shielding on that brake line. Even if the headers were coated, I would still be VERY concerned with boiling my brake fluid on only ONE of my front brakes. That could spell disaster. Hit the brakes, car pulls drastically to one side…

You have everything tacked with some massive tack welds. Try to keep your tacks smaller if you can. It makes pulling it apart much easier. And you don't have to hack as much leaving you with a haggard piece to try and weld up again later. Tacks don't have to be very big to be strong enough for what you are doing.

You should also keep in mind everywhere that is going to be a bitch to weld. Pull it apart, weld as much of it as you can separately. Then piece it together and finish welding. Where the three merge together, it looks like you have to weld around one of the tubes. That is going to be a pain/impossible if the whole thing is tacked together before welding.

Also remember to seal the middle of the three merging pipes ( Triangle space between them) while the collector is off if you haven't already. Otherwise that is going to be impossible to weld when the collector is on and all of your exhaust will leak right out of the middle of the three pipes.

Just some constructive criticism. Keep going, looks great!

Re: Tubular Headers to keep turbo in stock location

Cheers for the advice Jon that's good feedback & I do appreciate it. My inspiration came mostly from your car & without it I would not have gone balls deep into pretty much the first custom parts I have ever made.

I am not a welder and this is the first thing i have ever built so the tack welds are a bit nasty.

I won't be doing the welding I am going to send these out to get TIG Welded by a Mate who is a certified welder. He has done a lot of work on manifolds etc and told me to get them mocked up & he will take care of the rest.

As for the Brake Master Cylinder I have tried my best to make it closer to the rocker cover than to the MC, I think by the time i have them ceramic coated, maybe heat wrap the collector + a heat shield + re arranging the hard lines to get them out of the way + insulating the hard lines with some type of heat resistant covering should do the job.

But cheers thought, its good to know that you think its "awesome"

Besides somebody had to do it sooner or later.

At this stage I would like to Reuse the OEM Crossover pipe ( sure they wont be equal length anymore ) but i would hazard a guess that they will still perform bloody well and it will still be the first tubular setup to keep the turbo in a stock location with the added bonus of keeping some of the overall pipe length down.

Re: Tubular Headers to keep turbo in stock location

You could always go with an aftermarket booster located in the car that is a bit more expensive but will give you much more space. I plan on using Tilton units like my previous car only thing is I do not plan to have a complete interior and stock dash so I can run the reservoirs under the dash remote reservoir might do the trick for you.

so from what I gather..

These manifold will assembble pretty much like stock in the back location crossover and trhen the turbo will still sit in stock location?


Sounds good!

Re: Tubular Headers to keep turbo in stock location

suggestion based on SATAN's comments.

can you take the brake booster, rotate the entire unit, counter clockwise, and drill new holes to mount the entire thing, and then run new break lines that curve up and out of the way and around the master and down?

or better yet…

get a USDM brake master, i think the brake lines are already on the other side?
so if you shield the master on that side and put some of that steel-lined asbestos-cloth (or the asbestos free version) and use some fastening rivets, you could keep the heat down even more than factory shields…

Re: Tubular Headers to keep turbo in stock location

love the look and dedication
but why do it in the stock location? who's going to know besides a z31 enthusiast if the turbo is somwhere else?

those are going to be worse off for performance then a stock manifold.
i HIGHLY recommend ceramic coating those things so your spool isn't too much worse

all that extra surface area and thin wall is going to lower your heat expansion significantly which is what makes the turbo work

Re: Tubular Headers to keep turbo in stock location

Stock Location, honestly because I want to show people that you can have bad ass manifolds in the stock location
and comments of it wont work motivate me somewhat

Ceramic Coating was always the plan I do agree that they need the coating to be effective.

They may well be worse off for performance but I got off my ass and built something for myself and had fun building them If they don't work I will try something else untill i come up with something better that gets the gains that I'm looking for.

I have tried to keep things as compact as possible

The reasonable length primary and secondary's should promote a bit of low end torque to get the turbo spooling and offer low restriction and smooth response over the factory manifolds.

turbo's may work on heat expansion but they also work on Exhaust Flow which is what these manifolds are designed to take advantage of, they may be slower spooling but with a smooth responsive and low back pressure they will have their merits.

whatever happens they will look awesome when coated.

Re: Tubular Headers to keep turbo in stock location

It will never work.

Update me with the progress you make over the weekend.

Re: Tubular Headers to keep turbo in stock location

You'll get them done, they will work great, and you will be like, "Hey, this is awesome! It's such a good feeling that I made something on my own and it works well!"

Re: Tubular Headers to keep turbo in stock location

[quote]james wrote: i dont mean to knock on it cuz damn that shit is awesome. you could make a profit selling them if you can fit a bigger turbo in the stock location then what the stock manifolds offer.

what sized turbo you using?
WWR racing made 780hp with ported stock manifolds.

Re: Tubular Headers to keep turbo in stock location

Hey Yeah its all good,

I swear every single person has always asks me why the stock location so it gets tiring explaining so often.

I am using a Garrett/Air Research T3/T4 ( uh yeah pretty small i know ) I'm not sure what the biggest size could be fitted as i don't have anything to mock up with apart from the turbo I already have.

Re: Tubular Headers to keep turbo in stock location

Those look really good…now you have me wanting to give something like that a try… Actually, looks better than really good… I'm a big fan of a stock mounted turbo…and it's really nice to see a set of headers that keep that location, or at least very close to stock. Not to mention, if you pick up any low end at all from these, who cares? More low end on these cars can't do anything but help.


Can't wait to see the completely finished product.