I'm looking to expand on the whole exhaust thing. heard lots of options for headers for my 99 4.6 and was wondering if anyones got some advise for me. shorty? long tube? brand? stainless, ceramic? input anyone?

 

I can't believe nobody is talking on this one - there has got to be a bunch of you with headers !
I have pace setter shorty headers, they were painted black, now painted mud and rust. Pain in the **** to install, but the exhaust sounds amazing.

 

did you experience and gains in power? mileage? When you put headers on does that mean high flow converters are necessary too?

 

I got a little more grunt out of it, as for mileage I couldn't tell (pulling boats of all sizes - some were way over what I should have pulled), I'm not sure high flow converters are necessary, probably could help.

 

I've got Pacesetter shorties as well but they were an easy install as I had the motor out of the truck at the time. They were $207 on Amazon with free shipping so like $200 less than BBKs. I just couldn't see spending almost $400 and not getting long tubes but I didn't want to mess with the rest of my exhaust system. I am not impressed by the sound of my exhaust but I have a 40s series muffler and I think I would have been happier with a glasspack.

 

I'm not going to lie - Right when I started the install I thought about how much easier it would be to pull the motor ! That was a pain TIG-ing all those nuts on in there. Did yours have any clearance issues on the drivers side ? I had to put a slight dent in one of the pipes to make it clear the cross member.

 

Nope mine have a ton of room. My headers came with bolts that I used as well. I don't think they would have been bad to install in the truck for me mostly because I have a 3 inch body lift. Ratchet wrenches are one of the greatest inventiones ever made, it would have been a pain without them.

High-flows are never necessary, but you will lose some benefit from the headers without them. I'm waiting on a buddy with a mustang to redo his exhaust so I can take his catted H-pipe and put it in my truck, I think adding the high flows plus deleting the rear cat will make a huge difference in sound and power, but it's kind of expensive as I'll have to redo my exhaust setup I have now so it'll probably be a while.

Basically don't expect to bolt on headers and get much of a difference. I had the motor out so it was a good time to do it, plus I used a mustang motor in my truck and the manifolds have a different angle and the F-150 manifolds cost more than the $207 I spent on the headers, it just made sense.