header wrap or ceramic coating really worth it?
 

hey all. so I got my ss headers in today and i was looking at wrapping them initially. then a infinity master tech who ive had do work for me before tells me i should ceramic coat them instead. so i call the guy he recommends and he wants $250.00 to do the job. wrap itself is expensive also but not quite as much. so all in all is it really worth my time and money to wrap or coat these mo fo's?

$250 is ridiculous.

Heat shouldn't really be a big issue, so I wouldn't fret it much.

Might as well wrap though. $30, and it's a lot easier to do it now.

yea i have never tried to quote ceramic coating before so i dont know what a good price is but $250 seems a bit steep and i am pretty hesitant to dish out that cash.

it's not worth it. If you're running extra piping through a cramped engine bay then you might spring for it, but there's no need for your application.

GASP! what do you say is long term? i was planning on running shortys until the warranty is up/car is paid off. then go with some long tubes or forced induction. but those headers ARE NOT encouraging!

As the above pictures should be enough... however... there is also the factor that keeping the heat in can make the gaskets burn up very quickly. You are looking at VERY minimal hp gains on a V8.. on a V6 it makes even less sense. If you want to keep your engine bay cooler you can do things such as removing the insulation from the hood (though it would be louder) you can use ModShack's fang vent kit idea to route the hoses to that area to blow more outside air in to keep it cooler... I guess you could even take off the plastic under panel, but that I wouldn't recommend.

There's no need to go with short headers unless it's one of the only mods you're going to do. The stock headers supposedly are very good from what i've read so with other bolt ons you will get little to no power gain at all. I'd invest in either some ART pipes, HFC's, Intake or CBE. A CBE will not void your warranty as far as I know.

I agree. OP, I did a review on Stillen's shorty headers a while back that you might want to take a peek at. It has dyno results and all that. http://www.the370z.com/intake-exhaus...-vid-dyno.html

Trips--that's very misleading to post damaged headers from a fiero.

Those headers are not stainless steel, which is the reason there was an issue....the op's are.

Noted, I was going by past history and might of not even thought about the fact that the Ops were satinless steel, and the impact on that type of material?
since these would apply to typical steel headers, I've yet to see the long term effects on the stainless steel version.
Thank You for the clarification, and just to let folks know my experience doesn't come from a fiero that was only used as example. lol :tiphat:

Even stainless steel wll rust. It takes longer for it to happen, but i've also read that headers in general will rust when wrapped. If you are going to do anything... get them coated. Even then, overtime the coating can burn off... or else the old stuff would anyway.

ceramic coating is worthwhile, but wrapping it isn't good for a DD -- just becomes a place for moisture to collect and lead to rusting.

If you can get a serious high temp coating on there that's not too expensive, I'd do it, especially if the header is mild steel or average quality SS.

The z's unprotected underbody will rust out long before as headers do.

I have had wrapped Ss parts that went through ridiculous conditions with no issues.

But hey, no need to wrap them either. Just slap em on and go

the headers are the ss stillen headers. they will only need to last until i decide to go with lth or forced induction which is WAY down the line for me. i know some people have said to not bother with the headers and/or spend the money on other stuff like cbe hfc and or a tune. i already have kinetix hfc's, tope speed cbe with y-pipe and an uprev tune. i appreciate everyones advice and opinions about adding short tube headers but the bottom line is that they are going on. i have read alot of the posts about the headers and i have seen some good and some not so good. i havent seen much on how they do with a full exhaust set up plus a tune though. when i add them the car will be retuned at the same time. call me hard headed but i know that every car reacts different to mods and i want to see how mine will turn out. like i said, i truly appreciate everyone whos jumping in and offering their 2 cents however the headers are going on but i dont want to waste my time and $$$ wrapping them or coating them if they are either gonna get trashed from the wrap or not make any significant difference from having them wrapped or coated. as of today this is not my daily driver anymore. yay!

While I don't have personal experience with wraps or ceramic coatings, I do know I have heard on more than one occasion that the trapped heat from wrapping can lead to potential problems such as cracked welds and the like.

That's probably from the temperature differential between wrapped and unwrapped areas on the header.

Yeah, uniform high temp coating is definitely better.

It's not an 80's mustang. Have them coated or don't do anything at all. I recommend coating, though, as it will keep them nice.

When I bought my FI LTH's, Tony advised me that if I was going to do something to trap heat, to go with the coating instead of a header wrap. His logic was that the header wrap would trap moisture (from humidity) against the metal in the mornings and lead to premature corrosion of the metal, it kinda makes sense.

Keeping the heat trapped in the LTHs btw, aside from possible keeping the engine bay slightly cooler, helps keep exhaust velocity higher as well.

anyone who winds up with moisture issues wrapped their headers very wrong.


I put about 40k on my first jeep and 20k on my second one, with significant time offroading, in water, etc... had wrapped headers, no issues. On the heat front, my S2K saw much higher EGT's than you guys ever will, had no issues running wrapping downpipe, etc.

You need to wrap a cool pipe, and spray it when you are done.

lots of misleading info in here!

that picture needs to be taken down...

I agree to some extent since those were steel and don't apply here

Just going to echo Semtex's opinion here on the shorty headers, even though you're adamant: if you haven't dropped the money yet, you really shouldn't. I also ran them on my car at one point, and I consider it an early mistake. (a) the short headers do virtually nothing for this car, (b) they're a total PITA to install or remove, which means a bunch of sweat and work on your part, or a bunch of install money.

There are probably thousands of better things to spend time and money on for this car than shorty headers. If you're done with other breathing mobs, some random ideas from the thousands of other things: get some nice seats, put in a roll cage, get your hood vented, get a good aftermarket LSD, upgrade the coilovers, buy lighter wheels and/or brake rotors. Lots of those things will stick with the car even after you go FI, too.