dougs header d450

I read all the posts on the d450 dougs header for early abody.... don't remember anyone asking if the torsion bars have to be removed to intall the headers.. also if you have to cut the fenderwells to run any tubes thru.. these headers have so many slip connections wonder if you have to lift or raise one side of engine some to get them in there ? just wondering !
Some say these are a piece of cake to install and other not so...
my car is a 65 dart all stock 273 4sp. no PS .
What do you all think about the cerramic coating on the outside of the headers ? ... I was told they are not ceramic coated in the inside.
Thanks for any tech info !
john

I just finished putting my d450 headers in my 66 Barracuda. They were a pain but they are in now so I hope they do not leak anywhere. What they do not tell you in any of the ads is what the directions say that come with the headers. Yes you do have to lift the engine, they say about 4 inches. They also say to remove the right angle oil filter adaptor if you are using one which i did and the passenger side went in fairly easy. Oh, they also tell you to cut the flanges that go between the tubes against the headers. They ship them attached but you have to cut them to get the slip tubes apart. Now the drivers side was the fun one. I was putting my engine in after having the car redone so I did not have the z-bar in at first. I did lift the engine but they say you can get the lower part of the header around the torsion bar with a little muscle. That part was the easy part anyway.The middle tubes have 2 flanges which are a huge pain, one of the bolts you have to put in before trying to put the top of the tube down to attach it to the bottom of the flange. I am not necessarily recommending this but we ended up welding 3 of the 4 bolts in the top part of the middle tubes so that you did not have to play with them when trying to get the nuts started from the bottom of the car. We then put the starter in and the z-bar. The outer tubes go in okay then. A couple of the bolts into the head are also very tedious as you cannot get a good wrench fit so it took a long time to tighten the bolts. I know this is long but you have to be very patient. My brother and I worked for about 4-5 hours on the drivers side to finally get it in. We did have to dent the header slightly to clear the steering linkage, I also have no PS. We did this after the header was in and checked it out. We also had to slightly rework the brake lines to the master cylinder and the proportioning valve. I do have the ceramic coating and it did get scratched in a few places so I will have to see what that means when I have driven the car a bit. Oh, the slide areas are not ceramic coated and they tell you to put a Copper sealent in them. We kind of figured that they will rust together after a short while anyway. Just an aside, we also thought that if we ever did this again we might cut the flange that goes between the header tubes along the head as it would free up a little around the spark plugs.

I hope this helps.

After reading that post i can't imagine installing a set of those headers on a early A-Body. If you had the k-member out,installed the headers and engine on the k-member and then into the car it would be a lot less painfull. Allthough i have not fired up my TTI's in my 65 Dart the fit and finish is excellent. I did install the engine,trans,headers and k-member as a unit.

I have had both in mine, the Dougs were easier to install than the tti's. I did not have to remove torsion bars or steering column to install the dougs, however, the dougs run very close to the brake prop valve. Both headers rub the steering linkage, I jacked the Dougs up before tightening the header bolts and it helped minimize the rubbing. The tti's are better for performance.

Thanks you guys for that info on installation.. Gee ! looking forward to that .. sounds like a pain.


that is some good information !!!

I see that the tti has a larger collector 3" .. same size tubes dougs ... My idea was to cut the smaller 2.5" collector of dougs and install a larger 3" collector on the dougs. not a problem .