I have a '73 EB, 302, auto., that I bought last summer. It already has a dual-exhaust setup on it. Recently one of the muflers went out and I'm thinking of putting on headers, new mufflers, and custom piping. Does anyone have recommendations on headers? How about exhaust size - 2.5, 3"? I looked through many threads in the Exhaust forum but most of that was for newer trucks, and I can't find that many options from the usual suspects (Graveyard, Wild Horses, etc.). TIA

 

I have Duff long tube headers on mine. I have dealt with many other brands over the years, but the Duff headers are just more user friendly all around. They allow easy access for starter removal. They install pretty easily. I've had mine on for almost 4 years and I haven't had a problem with collector leaks or flange leaks.

Jason

 

I have Duff's chrome headers also. The only mod I had to do was reweld the clutch bellcrank so it would miss header. A 302 probably won't have this clearance issue,though.

 

Thanks guys. I was thinking of going with the L&L headers for sale on Bronco Graveyard. Much more expensive than the Duff headers ($359 vs. $199), but I read some good things about them. They are made of heavier gauge tubing and have a lifetime warranty. I saw some comments posted on other forums talking about a noticable improvement in performance. But I'm a rookie without experience, and I don't want to pay more if I don't have to (plenty of other things to spend money on
With the dual exhaust, will 2.5" pipe back to mufflers (another discussion) and out to tips work for me? I don't believe I have any significant mods to the engine (previous owner thought the previous owner may have had the engine bored out a bit). I also have questions about H pipes, 2.5 vs. 3", on and on, but will do more research before bothering you all.
Thanks again for your feedback.
Don

 

I have a '73 w/ a manual, and I installed the James Duff long tube headers (ceramic coated) a few months ago. They are the newly designed ones that are meant to work with their extended radius arms.

Here are my opinions:
- I have no lift. The James Duff staff warned me that there might be clearance issues if you have no lift (suspension). They were correct. The pinion yoke on my front diff. hits one of the primary tubes when the suspension compresses. It barely hits, and is only an issue when in 4 wheel drive 'cause it goes click, click, click as the pinion spins and hits only at the yokes widest part. The tube could probably be clearanced (beat with a hammer, or let the yoke clearance itself) but I got the headers with the ceramic coating and I don't want to ruin it 'cause it's expensive.

- I have 2.25" pipe all the way back to a Dr. Gas x-pipe (after the transfer case) and 2 chamber (40 series I think) Flowmaster mufflers. No tips. With the full length headers they couldn't get the x-pipe before the transfer case, with shortie headers you might be able to. I don't think an H-pipe before the transfer case would be a problem with the full length headers though. I definetly lost some low end torque with this setup, but got some good upper HP gains though, but the engine that was swapped into my Bronco before I bought it is more like a slightly built Mustang engine, so the power is more mid to upper RPM anyways. The sound is fairly smooth, but would be smoother if the x-pipe was closer to the headers. And it isn't as lound as I thought it would be, crossovers will quiet the exhaust a little and make it a higher pitch (thinking of ditching the mufflers completely, exhaust shop might have screwed me with some Delta Flows or something, I don't know). It does have a performance sound though, everyone thinks my Bronco is a Mustang coming around the corner, HA HA fooled them.

- The headers are good quality, and the ceramic coating looked good. If you ask James Duff, they'll tell you the company that does their coating, if I remember correctly, the company does have a website so you can go read up on them. The company is not Jet-Hot, but I don't remember who it is.

- The installation took about 2.5 hours. It took about 15 minutes to install the passenger side, just pulled the plugs, removed the stock aircleaner bracket and moved the dipstick out of the way a bit and it slid up from the bottom easy. The drivers side was a real b*tch. Don't even bother trying to install them from the top, they'll never go in. I had to remove everything on that side of the engine to get them in, I thought for a time I'd have to pull the entire engine (I did have to unbolt it from it's mounts and jack it up a bit) but they went in eventually. I'm sure some people have had better luck with these installs than me, so hopefully they could give you some better advice. Plus I started late Sunday evening and I had an appointment at the exhaust shop early Monday morning, that kinda' sucked.

- I have a 180 deg. thermostat and my Bronco used to sit right around 190 deg. after driving it a bit. Now with the ceramic coated headers and free flowing exhaust it'll actually stay around 180 deg. unless I start playing around on a hot day. I have no info for offroading since I haven't really been able to do any since the installation due to my header/pinion yoke clearance issues.

- If I had to do it over again I'd probably go with shorty headers for ease of installation, possible better crossover location, price, and mainly clearance. If you have a lift clearance shouldn't be an issue though, mine's sitting on stock sagging springs, and a lift is definetly in my future plans. Or maybe if someone on here has had some experience with a different brand/type of header they'll be nice enought to let us know.

- I also originally used the bolts that they provided which were adequate, but I upgraded to some Stage 8 locking header bolts. They are better quality (don't round off nearly as easily) and they have a slot for an allen wrench in them in case you can't get your box/open end on there. Approx. $40, but worth it in my opinion. Plus I used copper gaskets for my headers so they will never burn out.

I would like to thank James Duff for warning me first before installing these, now I just have myself to blame. No offroading for now, darn. At least it keeps me from breaking things...but where's the fun in that?

I hope this helps...

Caleb

 

i took the headers off and put the stock exhaust manifolds back on. sure was ALOT easier to work on and no more leaks. (then again it had a cheap set of headers on it when i bought it). so now it has stock manifolds, turbo mufflers and 2.5" from front to back. sounds good, runs good and no leaks or problems.

 

Bean, I have the same prob with my 74. The suspension lift didn't fix it. The front yoke on the the front driveshaft (pardon me if I use the wrong terms... I'm learning this stuff by myself as I go along) rubs on the header whenver the front end is engaged.

A 2" suspension lift really doesn't solve the problem. Well, it didn't for me. I tried using a ***-along on the header, but I really haven't had much progress with that. I pull it over about 4", but it pops right back. Much more than that and I get very nervous. Hell, to get that far I had to disconnect the exhaust pipe to clear the radius arm mount.

Anyway, JD told me that my front end is mounted on the left side of what's within tolerances for the Bonco. It seems like a longer... what's that part? grr. n Trac bar! It seems like a longer trac bar (like an inch or 3) would actually solve the problem, moving the yoke over enough. But I'll be damned if I'm going to buy a custom trac bar for something this silly.

The suspension I got actually had a trac bar drop bracket and it seems like the trac bar would move to the correct spot if I dropped it down to the 3.5" lift's slot.... but RCrawler told me once that it may mess stuff up. Apparently the angle on your trac bar should be parallel with .. another bar under there. Toldja I'm learning as I go!

Anyway, good luck, let me know what you do to correct the problem. I think my next steps will be to find out which bar needs to be parallel to the trac bar to see if that would work, then go pay an exhaust shop to make it work for me.

I hate to do it.... but I gotta have my 4 wheel drive working!

-Dawg

-Oh, Sparta. I had a friend with a Blazer that had cheap headers and he had the same probs. I think those problems are a "get what you pay for" kind of thing. =( Sorry you had problems, man.

 

Here's a picture.


You could move the track bar to the 3.5" location as long as they stayed parallel. But, it might cause the front end to be shifted too far to the passenger side.

Jason

 

Ahhh! That's the bar. Gotcha.
Thanks, Jason, I'll check that out as soon as I get home.