Has anyone had headers made?

[CrustyBuck]

Didn’t find too much, really didn’t dig all that deep either, but has anyone had a s hope fabricate headers for their isf? As I’ve mentioned Novel, Lems, and exhautech are common results for rhd headers, also 4x+ the cost of PPE rhd from the states. Starting to realize there isn’t many options out there besides these US and Japan based companies, but I know I can’t be the only fool who’s contemplating having a one off set made; so anyone taken this on with success? Cheapest set besides PPE starts at ~$5500, is rsther oay 3k for a made set out of stainless, I’m not good enough to weld titanium or aluminum so steel is the alloy of choice for me, but I don’t know what companies who have made some for members, or that can and or will, just reaching out I don’t mind shipping costs because for the price of these other options, it would still be less than theirs new and shipped. Thanks a bunch in advance 

[NothernDan]

Look at this on eBay
https://rover.ebay.com/rover/0/0/0?mpre=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.ebay.co.uk%2Fulk%2Fitm%2F123847398686

Not sure if they are any good but definitely lower priced than others. Zircotech will ceramic coat them for about £150 so they should last forever then, stainless or not. 

[Womble72]

Only know of one person, he’s not on here but has a Facebook page, he himself is Japanese and paid around £6000 from memory to have handmade titanium manifolds made for his GSF and a further £2000 for fitting by Lexus themselves to keep his warranty valid. 

[Womble72]

47 minutes ago, NothernDan said:

Look at this on eBay
https://rover.ebay.com/rover/0/0/0?mpre=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.ebay.co.uk%2Fulk%2Fitm%2F123847398686

Not sure if they are any good but definitely lower priced than others. Zircotech will ceramic coat them for about £150 so they should last forever then, stainless or not. 

Dan,

im hoping the fact that there aren’t more variations on options that they are all the same downpipe fitment. I’ve a set of GSF manifolds to be fitted and been quoted £900 as they can’t be sure of lineup low level. Hopefully it’ll be cheaper if they don’t have to fabricate anything, Lexus have been absolutely useless as they will only fit ISF manifolds and not GSF manifolds.....and will not confirm or deny fitment hence the reason they’re not fitted yet 🙄 

[CrustyBuck]

Woah 6k for-hand made? Novel has warranty ones for the gsf for that. I’m trying to avoid titanium. Also trying to avoid a giant price tag; ppe would do was hoping to get the sound captured. 

Getting another F to fit the ISF would be more expensive than just buying the headers for an isf. But hey thanks for at least getting me some answers, I got shunned on the American forum lmao 

 

[Womble72]

54 minutes ago, CrustyBuck said:

Woah 6k for-hand made? Novel has warranty ones for the gsf for that. I’m trying to avoid titanium. Also trying to avoid a giant price tag; ppe would do was hoping to get the sound captured. 

Getting another F to fit the ISF would be more expensive than just buying the headers for an isf. But hey thanks for at least getting me some answers, I got shunned on the American forum lmao 

 

These were made purely by hand, totally bespoke by an ageing craftsman, I know the cost wasn’t and didn’t fall at the right time but age was also a factor into the earlier than wanted purchase. It’s a 7 hour job to install without any sort of modification that maybe required with A  bespoke system, access is all from underside and includes gearbox removal if memory serves me well. Not something many places will undertake when a gearbox is £8k alone 😳.......your looking at a labour figure of around £500+ and that’s not Lexus hourly rate either, I’ve a crack in one of mine although it’s been there for 5yrs of ownership and there when purchased!.......which shows that the dealers are 100% franchised 🙄......hence the “they all sound like that on start up” 🙄.......100% my fault for listening to a salesperson 😂😂

[hockeyedwards]

A good watch if you have the time 🙂

[CrustyBuck]

2 hours ago, Womble72 said:

These were made purely by hand, totally bespoke by an ageing craftsman, I know the cost wasn’t and didn’t fall at the right time but age was also a factor into the earlier than wanted purchase. It’s a 7 hour job to install without any sort of modification that maybe required with A  bespoke system, access is all from underside and includes gearbox removal if memory serves me well. Not something many places will undertake when a gearbox is £8k alone 😳.......your looking at a labour figure of around £500+ and that’s not Lexus hourly rate either, I’ve a crack in one of mine although it’s been there for 5yrs of ownership and there when purchased!.......which shows that the dealers are 100% franchised 🙄......hence the “they all sound like that on start up” 🙄.......100% my fault for listening to a salesperson 😂😂

Oh, I can install them, I have prowess in that regard, but to tig weld, no dice. Maybe if I already had everything the right angle, and the flange I’d be able to take them together, and yes the age of the platform has been the downfall in affordable product continuation and overly expensive new r&d. Now it’s dated so no major company focus on it. 🤷🏻‍♂️ Late to the party can’t be to bothered by the support.

 

im holding off, I’m praying a used set goes up for sale. But these aren’t Subaru or evo, parts tend to stay on the car long term or not, and the car sells.  

 

Thanks everyone 

[d3ron]

Try https://www.originfab.com/

I'm sure they could do something. 

[Twellsie]

I spoke to Simpson race exhausts a while ago and iirc they wanted approx £2k, I am currently unemployed at the moment so the project is on hold, but the next people I am going to speak to os Benjamin Clowes Fabrication, his work is stunning!

[gb1600e]

On ‎11‎/‎10‎/‎2019 at 4:05 PM, hockeyedwards said:

A good watch if you have the time 🙂

 Well he makes that look simple enough. Could be frustrating he sums up!   You bet!

Nice bit of fabrication though and clearly going to be an improvement on exhaust flow.

Maybe not a job for this weekend  

[ubersonic]

On 11/10/2019 at 9:57 AM, NothernDan said:

Not sure if they are any good but definitely lower priced than others.

Disposable products are generally cheaper yes 😛

OBX started out making parts for Hondas but had to branch out once word of their "reliability" got around the Honda scene, generally speaking if their manifolds weren't trustworthy on a 2.2L VTEC in 2008 they're unlikely to be trustworthy on a 5L V8 in 2019 😛

[Twellsie]

if there is enough interest I would be happy to arrange a group buy, what drives the cost on items like this is the initial engineering to develop it, if that engineering cost can be shared over multiple units instead of a one off it will dramatically reduce the cost, , I have worked for the likes of Jaguar Land Rover, Rolls-Royce etc sourcing components like these.

 

Likewise I have worked with a UK manufacturer to develop 2 piece bells and rotor brake setup for the ISF, if a few are interested I would be happy to setup a group buy for these too

 

 

[CrustyBuck]

38 minutes ago, Twellsie said:

if there is enough interest I would be happy to arrange a group buy, what drives the cost on items like this is the initial engineering to develop it, if that engineering cost can be shared over multiple units instead of a one off it will dramatically reduce the cost, , I have worked for the likes of Jaguar Land Rover, Rolls-Royce etc sourcing components like these.

 

Likewise I have worked with a UK manufacturer to develop 2 piece bells and rotor brake setup for the ISF, if a few are interested I would be happy to setup a group buy for these too

 

 

Yes, a group deal would be amazing, without violating forums, I would say shotgun yourself on the American and Aussie forums if you’ve not done so already, PPE priced equal length for a RHD should pick up momentum rather quickly...and that’s awesome. That’s the next step after the current set up is due for an upgrade/refresh, 2 piece rotors. I’m in. 

 

[CrustyBuck]

18 hours ago, ubersonic said:

Disposable products are generally cheaper yes 😛

OBX started out making parts for Hondas but had to branch out once word of their "reliability" got around the Honda scene, generally speaking if their manifolds weren't trustworthy on a 2.2L VTEC in 2008 they're unlikely to be trustworthy on a 5L V8 in 2019 😛

Honestly, if the alloy is rigid enough to be altered they’d be good, bring them to reputable machinists and fabricators to be altered to a better configuration that fits and flows properly. But it’s structural integrity needs to be above average at a minimum 

[Twellsie]

Shipping costs and taxes would kill it

[Twellsie]

5 hours ago, CrustyBuck said:

Yes, a group deal would be amazing, without violating forums, I would say shotgun yourself on the American and Aussie forums if you’ve not done so already, PPE priced equal length for a RHD should pick up momentum rather quickly...and that’s awesome. That’s the next step after the current set up is due for an upgrade/refresh, 2 piece rotors. I’m in. 

 

shipping costs and taxes would kill it

[Northern isf]

Got PPE on mine make a great noise,to be honest the cost of getting a set fab'd up plus the fact there not going to be road tested either would put me off, theres no guarantee they'll give performance gains its a lot to shell out for,be good if you could get the dimensions from a set to make up

[Twellsie]

22 minutes ago, Northern isf said:

Got PPE on mine make a great noise,to be honest the cost of getting a set fab'd up plus the fact there not going to be road tested either would put me off, theres no guarantee they'll give performance gains its a lot to shell out for,be good if you could get the dimensions from a set to make up

disagree, exhaust manifolds are are pretty exact science, for a given displacement its pretty easy to calculate the length of the headers required to give the desired outcome.

 

Our cars as standard have log manifolds, which are extremely basic, with tubular manifolds you essentially have two options, long tube and short tube, long tube will give you greater peak power whereas short tube will give you greater initial torque (either will be an advantage over standard), my preference would be to go with a long tube equal length header (which I am uncertain that PPE or Sikky offer on a RHD application) however as I mentioned before its easily possible to overlay the power vs torque stats to determine the optimum lengths to get the best of both worlds.

[Northern isf]

What im saying is the available options have been tested and proven gains plus durability like cracking occurring i definitely wouldn't be spending a small fortune on Guinea pig parts especially after the sikky headers had a lot of cracking issues on the ISF. Id be very doubtfull an independent fabricator would be able to do a perfect job first time around and one thats going to last,would you put your money were your mouth is? Personally i think its a bad idea i like to see proven results and durability before i spend,just my opinion of course 👍

 

[Womble72]

Personally I wouldn’t know.......BUT I’m LED to believe the ISF manifolds were  a weak point in manufacturing, again I’m absolutely NO expert BUT as far as I’m aware Lexus corrected this weakness on the GSF manifolds, both have the same stud pattern layout and use the same gaskets, the increase in BHP is manifold configuration to a degree, I’ve a set of GSF manifolds that will be getting fitted to my ISF at some point due to a small crack in the ISF ones, not sure any power increase will be noticed as the car isn’t tracked or driven in track ways barring the odd burst where time, location and road layout allows.

[CrustyBuck]

2 hours ago, Northern isf said:

Got PPE on mine make a great noise,to be honest the cost of getting a set fab'd up plus the fact there not going to be road tested either would put me off, theres no guarantee they'll give performance gains its a lot to shell out for,be good if you could get the dimensions from a set to make up

It’s strictly the resulting exhaust note. UEL just doesn’t do it for me, and yes all headers in the market have R&D behind them, which is why if sikky and ppe can make affordable products, and reliable, for the ~$2000 price range, then so can other companies. However all RHD EL headers are $5500+, some cases more than triple ppe price. LEMS wants $9500 for just headers. Novel is $5500 exhautech doesn’t list but they primarily service Lamborghini/Ferrari type of cars so it won’t be much different. However they’re only japan companies, theres tons more car markets and scenes with like minded people, so the fact it’s so difficult to find anything makes it that much more  appealing if there is a company that has done what I’m looking for, I know it won't be cheap but it won’t be the previously mentioned highway robbery pricing  

[Northern isf]

Get on japanese eBay a set might come up . The best sounding ive found for me is the novels😊 but is anyone guna actually pay that much almost supercharger prices and i know were id be at with that choice,anyway hope you get sorted 👍

 

[CrustyBuck]

9 hours ago, Northern isf said:

Get on japanese ebay a set might come up . The best sounding ive found for me is the novels😊 but is anyone guna actually pay that much almost supercharger prices and i know were id be at with that choice,anyway hope you get sorted 👍

 

Novel and exhautech sound similar, love th sound but yeah if I’m going for power for that price I’d be better off with a sc kit and ppe which is likely but I would love to have that flat plane scream novel gives. Thanks I’m sure it’ll wind up with me just going with PPE 

[Nunz]

On 11/10/2019 at 5:42 AM, Womble72 said:

Only know of one person, he’s not on here but has a Facebook page, he himself is Japanese and paid around £6000 from memory to have handmade titanium manifolds made for his GSF and a further £2000 for fitting by Lexus themselves to keep his warranty valid. 

Hey man, do you have a link to his Facebook page?? Would love to hear this exhaust