If I wrap the headers with lots of heat wrap will that make it any quieter? my car is too loud right now, cs headers, aftermarket cat, cs catback. any opinions? experience? thanks a lot.

 

Depending on the wall thickness of the headers, yep, it usually does make a noticeable difference to noise. It will make a bigger difference if you wrap your whole exhaust too.

It will however kill your exhaust prematurely. I'm happy to use it on steam pipe headers because the walls are so damn thick it doesn't really matter, but on a lighter gauge steel I prefer not to.

 

Not sure about quieter, but it did changed the tone of my V6 when I wrap my headers.

 

Corksport is not the Quietest exhaust made out there..that is why your exhaust is loud.
I went Racing Beat and I never looked back.

 

what do you mean kill your exhaust prematurely? its a light gauge steel, it might melt the cat. or catch fire

 

I can't give you a super scientific answer, but the heat wrap doesn't allow heat to escape from the pipes. Which is a good thing for performance as it keeps ambient engine bay temps down and should mean slightly more exhaust velocity seeing as the heat is retained within the pipes. The downside is that the structure of the steel is weakened/degraded from the heat stress and the additional oxidization that takes place with the extra heat.

So the pipes literally rot away until they crack or develop a hole well before they would if left un-wrapped. As I said, it usually isn't much of a problem with steam pipe manifolds because there is so much material to begin with. However with thinner walled pipes, they don't tend to last as long. It is evident if you have for example run exhaust wrap for 12 months or more, if you remove it you will find the metal is all flaky and scaly on the surface - literally shedding material.

Hope that makes sense.

I'm not saying don't use it, because I sure do, just making sure you're aware of the possible repercussions.

 

That is the same exact experience I had when I heat wrapped my headers. Granted they were on a race car, but in less than 1 year of races and testing (maybe 17 days on track) I blew a hole in the first radius bend and the pipes all looked like sandstone in both bends. I could almost pick them apart with my fingers and for sure with a screwdriver. I would strongly recommend against doing it as rotary exhaust gets far hotter than piston engine exhaust and I believe exceeds the maximum structural metal temp threshold of mild steel. If your header is stainless, then thats a whole other ball game and wrapping them may work.

Eric

 

How do you go about managing heat without turbo blankets and heat wraps? Just heat shields and good air venting/ducting?

 

Ceramic coating works.

 

I use an obx resonator, the sound is amazing.
Vibrant also makes a nice resonator. I would use there oval shape for 3" exhaust

 

But doesn't that still retain the heat inside the metal which can lead to premature metal fatigue?

 

wraps trap moisture and moisture makes pipes rust.

 

+1.

Holds the moisture in, holds the heat in, perfect recipe for heavy oxidation.

You should see the flaky rust that comes off attached to header wrap when it's removed. You could make a whole set of headers from the stuff coming off.

 

Coat both sides, and multiple layers rather than single layers. Ceramic on both sides will keep pipe cool. Will reduce your internal diameter slightly though if your one of those people that cares about such things.

 

They could also catch fire, you have to be careful and do it right.

 

Calico coating does a coolblack and coolchrome coating that is fantastic. I had them do the dp on on my modified fd. You can put your hand on the pipe after running the engine for 20 minutes or so. They coat them inside and out. I believe they do work for NASCAR.

 

To keep my floor boards and transmission and rear axle cool, I use heat shields made from stainless steel sheet metal, spaced about 1" off the pipes. The heat shields really work on keeping the floors cooler.

 

The ceramic paint from those autoparts stores don't do jack. If you want to get some ceramic coating go send them to a place that specifically does it. It will be a nice thick gritty coating that is off-white almost kind gray-ish.

 

He said yes running a Corksport header. Which is stainless. Rust won't be a problem like say my bullshit overhyped racingbeat pos. my Corksport exhaust is pretty stout and a **** ton cheaper. Yeah it's loud but **** it. If you're looking to quiet your exhaust don't look into heat wrap.

 

My racing beat has not rusted and its about 7 years old, been wrapped for the last 2 and goes to snow rallys and "mud bogs" sure its got some on the surface but its still intact!