My "new" '74 Duster- or why I need a project like a hole in the head
Nice grease zerk locatation.
Which one? The LCA pin? Worked
awesome for the poly LCA bushings.
Looks great!
Glad to see a comparison between the two headers, been debating about some Dougs and this gives me some additional info to chew on.
Thanks!
Yeah I was kind of disappointed with the TTI shorties. I mean, I'm sure they work great, and compared to the Doug's I think that they do have fewer tight spots for clearance. But the places they are tight are just as bad. I think because of their design that you would get away with not denting the headers, but I know I would have needed to add at least a couple of dimples to the head pipes on my car. And not just because I have 1.12" torsion bars either, the driver's side was super close to the z-bar and even the prop valve for the brakes.
I'm not saying the TTI shorties aren't good headers. I think I just kind of expected
big changes, and I really didn't see them. The ground clearance change is very minor. The clearance changes are decent, and the install would have been easier if I just had to do the work to swap from manifolds to the TTI shorties. But of course I already had the Dougs in there, so, I had to do just as much because I had to remove the Dougs first. Still though, you have to drop the starter, oil filter, and z-bar (for a 4 speed) no matter what. All I did in addition to that was the torsion bars, center link, and the exhaust studs on the passenger side. The center link is a piece of cake, hardly worth mentioning. The torsion bars aren't easy, but I was already doing that and compared to lifting the engine I think it was way easier. The exhaust studs of course meant draining the radiator. Having done the TTI install though, there would be some acrobatics involved with the torsion bars in place. Especially ones larger than 1". I didn't try it, but not having them in there was why it was so easy. The other thing is that the biggest place that's tight on clearance is at the oil filter. Which means changing the oil filter is just as big of a pain in the *** with the shorties as it is with the long tubes. I mean, once I got over putting a couple dimples for the torsion bars into the Doug's that part is over. Never have to worry about that again. But the damn oil filter? And even with the stock plate without a 90* adaptor you couldn't have used all the shorty filters. I mean, like there's ONE that would be short enough to fit, a #2004 (4.1" tall). I had a mopar #P4452890, which is a short filter, and it wouldn't have fit even without the Canton plate. Not on my car. Which would mean you'd still have to run a 90* adaptor, or a stock filter plate and the shortest filter you can buy.
I think most of it for me was expectation. I expected a couple of big differences (ground clearance, oil filter clearance) and neither of those really materialized. I just like the Dougs better, they're a great header. I'll run the TTI shorties on my Dart, it's got a 318, less power, its an auto so no z-bar or inspection plate issue, and I haven't already made the exhaust for that car so I won't be doing a ton of work to convert from long tubes to shorties, just building the system for the shorties to begin with.
