Turbowerx header installed - impressions and pics

[elsenorfon]

Let me start by saying that I just got my Boxster S in February and just recently found this site. In just a few weeks I found so much invaluable and helpful information here at renntech, and also at babblers, so I'm trying to give a little back. It's not much, but those in the market for headers should probably take the time to read this since it's hard to find out REAL information on these products. I also want to be very clear that I have nothing to do with the manufacturer or seller and have no vested interest. These are just my thoughts, and although I do not have any Porsche experience, I do have a lot of tuning experience so I'm pretty familiar with what is and is not a quality product.

After putting the car in the air and looking at the bottom of the engine I immediately found the need to change from the stock headers. I do not at all like their design as they appear very very restrictive. I don't have a ton of money and somebody on Babblers.org had suggested the Turbowerx headers so I gave them a shot.

Install

I will say very plainly that headers are MUCH easier to install than a muffler is on this car. I was actually quite surprised how easy it was to take off the old header and put the new one on. I used PB blaster on all the bolts and let them sit for ~1 hour before removing the old bolts and not a single one gave me a hard time. I did not expect that at alllllll. :)

To note, the Turbowerx headers have 2 bolts that are very tricky to tighten with a ratchet and likely will need a box wrench to tighten down all the way. The plastic shield on the passenger side of the car I loosened up to help get to them. That was a simple removal of 2 screws and 2 nuts.

Quality

All I have to way is "wow." I have seen a number of headers in my day and none are the quality of these! I spoke with the company and the guy said he does them himself, although he outsources the flanges, he does all the welds and developed the tubes himself. Impressive and made in America! Woohoo!

The steel is beautiful, the welds are perfect and clean, and the flanges are very thick (1/2"!!). The F1 merge collectors are the perfect choice here also in my opinion. Bravo all around.

Performance and Sound

First a quick note on sound. The cats are deleted (Yay CEL!) and the pipes are thicker. This by itself definitely made the car sound throatier and a little more imposing. After also putting on an aftermarket muffler it's very loud, but regardless of muffler this WILL make it louder by a noticeable amount, although not too much.

As for performance, I do not have access to a dyno so I cannot give a perfect answer here. The website shows a dyno graph that illustrates a 22hp/18tq increase for the 3.2L and even more for the 2.7L. The seat of my pants says: "I believe it." The car really starts pulling anywhere over 3k rpm much more than before, and once it hits 5k...it's a crazy difference. Wow. The only other modification I had was a K&N filter, desnorkled, and now also a performance muffler (but the muffler didn't make a difference really).

Other than when I put a turbo on my NA car years ago, this is simply the best single-mod performance difference I have yet encountered-it's THAT good. Enough said.

Final Thoughts

I have absolutely nothing bad to say about these headers. They're CHEAP, or relatively though. They cost me $799 and I bought them during a free shipping promotion. Sweet! For that price I in no way expected such a beautiful piece or such a dramatic increase in performance. Best bang for your buck I've seen in my time. I know the pics aren't great but they were taken with my Blackberry so my apologies, I tried! Please feel free to ask me any questions if I left anything else out.

Edited April 11, 2009 by elsenorfon

[elsenorfon]

Pics

[elsenorfon]

Stock pics

[macsak]

how often do they run free shipping and how did you find out they were offering the promotion?

mahalo (thanks)

aloha

steve

Stock pics

[elsenorfon]

I have no idea how often they offer free shipping, but the $30 in shipping shouldnt be a deal breaker IMO. If you're really dead set on it, the owner or TurboWerx is really cool (or was to me) so if you just mention that you were in contact with him while they were offering free shipping he'll honor it. I didn't even know about the free shipping when I ordered, I just mentioned that I had sent him an email a couple weeks ago and HE was the one who mentioned the free shipping (because he thought we'd talked about it) and honored it even though it was an old promotion. Worth a try :)

[macsak]

mahalo (thanks) for the reply

as you may have noticed, i am in hawaii, so shipping does become a HUGE consideration sometimes

also, thanks for the detailed review

aloha

steve

I have no idea how often they offer free shipping, but the $30 in shipping shouldnt be a deal breaker IMO. If you're really dead set on it, the owner or TurboWerx is really cool (or was to me) so if you just mention that you were in contact with him while they were offering free shipping he'll honor it. I didn't even know about the free shipping when I ordered, I just mentioned that I had sent him an email a couple weeks ago and HE was the one who mentioned the free shipping (because he thought we'd talked about it) and honored it even though it was an old promotion. Worth a try :)

[elsenorfon]

happy to help. i'd definitely give them a call and see what they can do. best luck

[mikes_box]

happy to help. i'd definitely give them a call and see what they can do. best luck

how much for the headers? did you buy on ebay?

[elsenorfon]

$799 for the headers, they're not on eBay, I ordered directly through turbowerx

[yuyokatana]

Let me start by saying that I just got my Boxster S in February and just recently found this site. In just a few weeks I found so much invaluable and helpful information here at renntech, and also at babblers, so I'm trying to give a little back. It's not much, but those in the market for headers should probably take the time to read this since it's hard to find out REAL information on these products. I also want to be very clear that I have nothing to do with the manufacturer or seller and have no vested interest. These are just my thoughts, and although I do not have any Porsche experience, I do have a lot of tuning experience so I'm pretty familiar with what is and is not a quality product.

After putting the car in the air and looking at the bottom of the engine I immediately found the need to change from the stock headers. I do not at all like their design as they appear very very restrictive. I don't have a ton of money and somebody on Babblers.org had suggested the Turbowerx headers so I gave them a shot.

Install

I will say very plainly that headers are MUCH easier to install than a muffler is on this car. I was actually quite surprised how easy it was to take off the old header and put the new one on. I used PB blaster on all the bolts and let them sit for ~1 hour before removing the old bolts and not a single one gave me a hard time. I did not expect that at alllllll. :)

To note, the Turbowerx headers have 2 bolts that are very tricky to tighten with a ratchet and likely will need a box wrench to tighten down all the way. The plastic shield on the passenger side of the car I loosened up to help get to them. That was a simple removal of 2 screws and 2 nuts.

Quality

All I have to way is "wow." I have seen a number of headers in my day and none are the quality of these! I spoke with the company and the guy said he does them himself, although he outsources the flanges, he does all the welds and developed the tubes himself. Impressive and made in America! Woohoo!

The steel is beautiful, the welds are perfect and clean, and the flanges are very thick (1/2"!!). The F1 merge collectors are the perfect choice here also in my opinion. Bravo all around.

Performance and Sound

First a quick note on sound. The cats are deleted (Yay CEL!) and the pipes are thicker. This by itself definitely made the car sound throatier and a little more imposing. After also putting on an aftermarket muffler it's very loud, but regardless of muffler this WILL make it louder by a noticeable amount, although not too much.

As for performance, I do not have access to a dyno so I cannot give a perfect answer here. The website shows a dyno graph that illustrates a 22hp/18tq increase for the 3.2L and even more for the 2.7L. The seat of my pants says: "I believe it." The car really starts pulling anywhere over 3k rpm much more than before, and once it hits 5k...it's a crazy difference. Wow. The only other modification I had was a K&N filter, desnorkled, and now also a performance muffler (but the muffler didn't make a difference really).

Other than when I put a turbo on my NA car years ago, this is simply the best single-mod performance difference I have yet encountered-it's THAT good. Enough said.

Final Thoughts

I have absolutely nothing bad to say about these headers. They're CHEAP, or relatively though. They cost me $799 and I bought them during a free shipping promotion. Sweet! For that price I in no way expected such a beautiful piece or such a dramatic increase in performance. Best bang for your buck I've seen in my time. I know the pics aren't great but they were taken with my Blackberry so my apologies, I tried! Please feel free to ask me any questions if I left anything else out.

Hi, so this headers are without cats correct? Did you installed both 02 sensors? Did you get a CEL?

[elsenorfon]

Hi, so this headers are without cats correct? Did you installed both 02 sensors? Did you get a CEL?

The front cats are taken out. I moved both o2 sensors downstream after the 2nd cats. CEL is all set once you move them.

[huzzah]

have the same headers, a giac chip, internally modified muffler- pse style, and an intake snorkle cut off with about 2 inches remaining with a bellmouth at the opening to smooth the flow. each step made a difference, but the header, and resulting loss of the pre-cat really made a difference, the sound rips when you want it to and burbles gently when you are just rollin through town, more torque off the line, snappier engine response.

best headers out there? i think so, and the guys are great to deal with.

no cels in 3+ years of use. relocated the bungs as mentioned above and breezed through deq as well, keeping the back cats still enables the car to clean up the exhaust.

and did i mention they look sweet when you happen to find yourself flat on your back under the car?

jv

[1schoir]

Definitely a nice upgrade, and the headers look awesome.

However, a word of caution is in order for those with older 986's or others who may drive in areas where salt is used to melt ice and slush on the roads...

Those twelve bolts that fasten the exhaust manifolds to the cylinder heads don't always come out that easily. Sometimes, one or more will snap off, even after liberal and long term application of P-B Blaster, or WD-40.

IIRC those bolts are only supposed to be fastened with about 12 or 14 ft/lbs of torque at the factory, so if you are finding that you require a whole lot more ft/lbs to unscrew them, be careful!

Otherwise, be prepared to delve into the "Art of Bolt Extraction".

I went through that experience, and I must say, even with all the difficulties, there is no sweeter sound than that of headers and a PSE Exhaust!

Here is a link to what I experienced: http://www.renntech.org/forums/index.php?s...&hl=headers

Mine's a '97 with only 24K miles on it, and I'm pretty sure the exhaust manifold had never been removed before. If you have a newer car you'll probably have an experience closer to that of "elsenorfon".

Regards, Maurice.

Edited January 5, 2010 by 1schoir

[wilson1]

This looks good!