Rams Horn Exhaust Manifold

[Guest Jmant83]

I was wondering what peoples thoughts were on "rams horn" exhaust manifolds. I have a pair on my 327 and have been contemplating switching to sanderson headers. Some say I should keep the manifold others say I should switch. Any thoughts?

[deja]

When I bought my 280Z it already had a 350 in it with some long tube headers. But the headers were pretty much shot (broken at the flange) so I decided to use the ramshorn manifolds rather than messing with new headers. I was thinking this was a daily drivers and the headers wouldn't really make that much difference on the street. But the engine had some performance work done on it including a rather hefty cam (no clue about specs) before I got it. There was a noticable lose of HP with the ramshorns. But that could have just been because of the engine, if your's isn't too radial you might not notice any change going to headers. It will be hotter and noisier with headers.

[badjuju]

in all my v-8 swap experience (hah), just go with a set of headers.

 

There's a reason everyone and their mother gets headers for their cars.

[Pyro]

It mostly depends on the cam in the engine on how much power will be lost with exhaust manifolds.

 

A cam with 240 degrees duration at 0.050" could lose 50hp with a set of stock manifolds versus full length headers. A set of shorty block huggers will be down 25hp as compared to a set of full length headers.

 

However, if the engine has a mild cam in it, the losses may only be 20 to 25 hp with manifolds versus full length headers and only a 10hp loss with block huggers.

 

Block huggers are a nice compromise.