A clever way to mock up headers.

I ran across this in that “Mazda KL thread” that had a link to this crazy kiwi putting a KL in some ancient vauxhall car I’ve never heard of. 

Pretty neat idea. Bend the rods to shape, if you can move all the wood circles freely and take them off, you should be golden. It’s much better Than my method of “measure, measure, chop, fit, tack, measure, remove tack, measure, scrap pie cut, measure again, chop, fit, tack, good?, crawl under car, remove header flange, climb in engine bay, remove the rest of the header flange, take to bench, weld, reinstall header flange, repeat insanity.”

I have used this method with pretty good results.

Looks like an easy way to get them all the same length!

Or close at least.

I've used welding rod with pipe insulation before.

3d print sections and put them in place:  see bottom of this thread

https://grabcad.com/library/exhaust-bend-sections-1

For a header you probably want free spinning sections though.

I really like the welding rod/ pipe insulation idea. Wish I'd thought of it when I (attempted to) make a manifold. Cuz I do not intend to ever try that crap again..

Great idea.  Thanks for sharing.  Seems like it could be useful for mocking up custom duals too.

In reply to _ :

There might be a problem if two or more pipes need to fit in the same place together.  Or you can’t get that radius in a bend. 

I use plastic PVC pipe and glue.  Easy to cut, accurate as far as bends go.  

In reply to ProDarwin :

This guy has made something similar but spinable, snap together in many tubing sizes and centerline radii.

https://www.thingiverse.com/XeonDesigns/designs

That is an amazing idea.  I thought of something else that may work?  WATER NOODLES  Thoughts?  I'm assuming you can get different diameters to compensate for header size?

chknhwk said:

That is an amazing idea.  I thought of something else that may work?  WATER NOODLES  Thoughts?  I'm assuming you can get different diameters to compensate for header size?

The pipe insulation with welding rod inside (I use 1/8" alum tig rod) is about the best I've ever trying short of the way cool lego type header kits.  You can get the stuff in just about any OD...they do move a round a little but but you can get really good results and its dirt cheap.

In reply to RacetruckRon :

Nice! A lot of printer time but maybe worth the time investment, I'm told the commercial lego things save a ton of fab time since you know exactly what you need.  With noodles I spent about 40 hours on my headers I think.....holding up different bends and deciding what's closest, cutting...recutting....a lot of time

RacetruckRon said:

In reply to ProDarwin :

This guy has made something similar but spinable, snap together in many tubing sizes and centerline radii.

https://www.thingiverse.com/XeonDesigns/designs

Awesome