When you click on links to various merchants on this site and make a purchase, this can result in this site earning a commission. Affiliate programs and affiliations include, but are not limited to, the eBay Partner Network.
I couldn't justify paying that much more for a set of IH. I inspected the welds on mine and looked good enough. I did however replace all the bolts with a superior quality set. I live in the South West Desert (Imperial Valley, 15 miles from John Wood) so rust is not an issue for me here. (112 degrees today. )
I've had them in the truck for about 4 years now with no issues.
There are some parts that must be OEM, this is not one of them, in my humble opinion.
I snagged a pair of used IH bellowed up-pipes (excellent condition) and installed them almost 3 years ago and couldn't be happier. I only mention it because used up-pipes can sometimes offer you a more economical approach to solid IH equipment.
EDIT... never mind... I searched for a few minutes and cannot find any used IH up pipes available anywhere (did not search the salvage market).
When I did mine there were no other makes available except IH. They were expensive, don't remember how much but I do remember it was painful at the time. The pain is long forgotten and they are an excellent fit and finish. Working slow not under any time line pressures the install went very well. Replaced a pile of other stuff while I was in there like hpop lines, boots and added an Frx.
I used the Dorman uppipes, no problems. I did use a die grinder for a few minutes to polish the inside of the collector. Maybe it wasn't necessary, but it made me feel better to have them smooth
Here's the beginning post in my thread where I replaced the uppipes. It's long and some other stuff in there, too, but you should see a bunch of pics and then a "lessons learned" list a little later. Maybe something there can help your install, whichever brand you use
I also went Dorman due to low cost online. However my recommendation is buy Dormans at a shop, not online. Inspect them before purchase, and if they have a quality issue grab another one right then and there. Like thumping a box of watermelons until you find the one you want.
What to look for: completed, adequate welds. Bolt holes that go all the way thru. Alignment pin that is not mushroomed from installation. Alignment pin that is actually aligned; mine was clocked out by something like 5 degrees, so the butt cheeks on the collector did not align with the corresponding holes on the turbo. I ended up doing a lot of grinding and smoothing to get that lined up.
Seems like the quality has improved for the Dormans in the last year or three, but I still recommend inspecting before purchase to save yourself potential trouble. Online price will be better but the cost difference is easy to pay to avoid trouble.
I just installed 2 sets. One on my truck and one on my dad's.
Mine were AlphaDog and came from Amazon for $121. The reviews were better than Dorman and they were cheaper. They looked good and fit perfectly.
My dad was wanting to save money where he could so we went with the $67 eBay set. Don't remember the seller name but they were shipping from TN. Just got them on yesterday. They also fit just fine. They could have possibly been the same manufacturer but my "baby's butt" was smoothed more (where they grinded out the casting high spots) and the lower bolts were different.
Both sets looked good on the welding. They are not stainless with the magnet check.
My opinion, it's a place to save money if you want.
You can also delete the EBPV yourself and save some coin. A new non-EBPV outlet is over a hundred bucks, a grinder and freeze plug will cost you a dollar.
There's lots of posts about how to do it.
Up pipes are a pretty tough job. I wanted to do it right the first time. About 7 or 8 years ago I went with the IH ones and haven't had any trouble at all.
In my opinion, the job was not hard at all to replace the up-pipes, except for when trying to mate the collector up to the turbo. Other than that, the install was a breeze if you truck is not infected with rust that is.
I went into the project expecting a lot of work, and they came out just fine. Went in just fine too, then trying to get the clamp on the collector was a pain in the ***, but after about 20 minutes of swearing and wrestling it into place, it was back together.
Now here's something that cracks me up. I went with the IH set because of my experiences with Dorman and knew I was tackling a job that I didn't want to do twice. And I paid dearly for the hardware. But...then...when I go to do the Hutch/Harpoon mods I'm going to do it 'on the cheap' and dig up some brake line (either out of my collection of stuff here or my local NAPA) and get the in-line screen filter that has been talked about here rather than buy what I think is an overpriced kit from a vendor.
I have a parts list on one of my threads that I sourced from Amazon and a couple of pieces from Ebay. The kit was fairly cheap, built with quality parts that I selected.