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Front Engine Dragsters / Build a budget set of zoomie sbc headers for under $100
« on: April 23, 2013, 07:05:36 PM »
Been looking for a used set of zoomie headers, nothing really available so i looked into building a set. mandrel bent bends were very expensive like $20 a bend and then get flanges. I then went to several exhaust shops about buying tubing and having it bent also crazy cost and ulgy shoe marks. So i was in home depot and i noticed thin wall emt electrical conduit 90 deg bends 1.5 inch but it looked kinda big when i measured it od it was 1.75 so i went home looked in a jegs catalog and ordered flanges 1.75 oval port with gaskets and header bolts for $47 dollars. local electrical supply place sold me eight bends for $ 4.68 a bend. everything was at the house wen i got home. Out to the shop the correct lay back was aprox 50 degrees made a jig in the vice a clamp below the vice jaws as a depth guage and clamped a piece of angle to the back side of the vice as a stop so when i squeezed the tubing oval each would be the same after makthe ends the same installed them in flanges checked the angle with a angle finder and clamped the other end between two wood 1x4s to maintain spacing angle and keeping them even then tacked them to flanges. under 2hrs start to finish except for a strip to to hold all the ends together. instant cool retro header take a look.