Brandon Boomhauer

iTrader: (10)

This will be long, but I would like advice on the part of the thread where I speak of the heads...

Well to start off the manifold bolts were a bitch to get loose. Got back where I could get #7, asked a guy that works where I did the install to see if he could get back there and break it loose..... He touches the damn bolt and it was broke, he never even put a wrench on it. Was it broke outside the manifold, or flush or near that with the head? NOOOO, half the bolt is in the head. Anyways, for the passenger side, I tried under, over, through the fender well etc... No GO. So I finaly disconnected my A/C on the firewall, moved it out of the way, in the process screwing up the insulation crap around it (the innards of it fell out..) and loosing the nut & bolt that hold the clamp together and tight. Those are a smooth $21.** from the dealership. The passenger side also sits damn near to the tranny cooler lines, which I'm hoping is alright for now since the coating should keep 'em cool enough??? I do have access to alot of header wrap, if you recommend I do that, I can in no time. Or should I try to bend them out of hte way? The drivers side went in very well from the bottom with only removing the #5 and #7 plugs. Welding the exhaust up was a bitch though. Maybe it was the shop, maybe it was how the flanges were welded up, I dont know, but it was a PITA. My Y pipe was pretty much ditched, short (1.5") extentions were welded onto the cat with the flange, so I could actually bolt them up. Then the Y piece etc was welded up and ran back alot further than factory. I used the same muffler I've had since about a month after I got the truck... (bought March 02) The factory Y piece was welded about 16inches from the muffler, and part of the 3in pipe that was formally used from the Y-Pipe to the muffler was used as a turn-down/hat. Also I used the factory gasket and have no leaks on the drivers side, even with one bolt gone on the rear. The thick flanges help for that I believe.

For what really matters.
The performance gains were amazing, I am very pleased with the SOTP feel. It seems to pull alot harder all over and 55-70 seems instant. The exhaust note is alot quieter (what I LOVE) cruising down the highway it is not audible. Under 1700-ish, it has a completely different tone, one of what I call old school sound, being a carbed small block with longtubes and true duals. Its not very loud there either, more of a solid sound there. WOT isn't as loud, but sounds alot better.

A BIG THANKS to Futral Motorsports for shipping the headers the day I ordered them, and for the sticker (black ) and shirt. I'll still put the sticker on anyways, pewter03gmc still hasn't sent me a LS1Tech sticker, and I don't have paypal to get one. Anyways Futral's service was simply amazing, great to talk to, very knowledgable right off the bat, knew trucks, and so on. Candy replied to my emails very quickly and even bragged about her Tahoe.

Now I get to decide what to do to get the manifold bolt out of the head. I'm 99.9% sure I'll have to pull the head to get it out, and I will probably have it done instead it up even more. Now what all will I when I go to put the heads back on? Any special tools I'll need? I am in no hurry to do it, as it isn't leaking, but it just bugs me and doesn't look right with no bolt. Should I worry about it and will it leak eventually? Or should I save up and get a set of heads from a shop on the right? I've seen some pretty nice deals with complete heads, cam, pushrods. Kinda thinking about getting a 6l short block to run that on though. But I doubt I will till the 5.3 gives up (runs strong as hell with 85k too!

Sorry this is so long, and I may not have worded it very well, but I'll go back over it in the morning and may split it into seperate threads dealing with the install/exhaust/heads/etc.

JSmith

iTrader: (5)

Man, sorry that install went so crappy for you. Glad you're enjoying the gains though! I noticed a nice increase when I installed my Hamm headers. My install went alot smoother though. 4 hours and then a trip to the exhaust shop and done. Sorry had to rub it in a little.

Brandon Boomhauer

iTrader: (10)

ah its fine, I always get the **** luck. The upd install said 15 minutes, it took me like 1.5hrs or so... just because I tried using soapy water like they said... Now i can do it in a few minutes with grease or something....

I may go back and run true duals with an X and have a couple cutouts installed, but I might go somewhere else. I just want to find mufflers that flow well, but arent loud at cruising speeds, and I may ditch the cats too...

when i drove it to the exhaust shop (bout 10miles) it started loadin up at low rpms... but man was it loud!

Hit Man X

Yes open long tubes are LOUD as hell! I went through a drive-thru like that once.

ThunderZ28

iTrader: (7)

try using a bolt remover. we used one of these when a bolt broke off in my buddys intake manifold. thought we where screwed. drilled a hole into the center of the broken bolt used the bolt extractor( which is nothin more than a tap with reverse threads) then you use that to screw the bolt out. worked pretty good for us. thought it might work for you. you can probably get the tool at any tool shop, or probably Sears hardware.
hope this helps ya.

Slowverado

Brandon, i told you to bring it down here and let me and Dan do the install didn't i??? i have what you need to pull that broken bolt out, but i'm not sure if there's enough room that far back to do it. i'll look tomorrow at my head and see.

Flyer

iTrader: (1)

It took me about 2 hours to get mine in the second time. Did you try moving the intake tube and pushing the heater core hoses back? That did it for me, after that I could slide the passenger side one in place with almost no bumps on the way down. The drivers side was even easier. The steering column, big clump of wires, and the battery terminal thing on the block and it went into place.

About the broke bolt ... it seems like GM likes to cross thread that bolt from the factory. My guess is it was cross threaded and whoever put it on put that bolt in there to make it pass inspection. Mine's just crossthreaded.