My car recently started running like poop, and I could hear a loud crackling sound somewhere in the exhaust. On top of that, the motor was clearly running super rich, as my rear bumper was covered in soot, and my gas mileage had taken a significant dive.

I finally had the chance to put the car on a lift, and here is what I found on my Spoon 4-2-1 header:

Hairline cracks at the anti-reversion chamber welds:


Larger crack at the merge collector:


Had a chance to pull off the header tonight as I got a JDM 4-1 to use as a substitute; off comes the header and the full extent of the damage is revealed


No wonder my primary 02 sensor is FUBARed. Anyhow, the Spoon is going to be sent to Dave at SMSP to see what kind of salvage can be done at this point.

Any ideas on WHY this happened? The header only has a minor ding.



<u>I'm not pissed, and I'm not bitching at Spoon. Just a bit befuddled as to how it happened.</u>
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Oh and a huge THANK YOU to my bud Ed Liu (aka "yellow blur"/EvasiveMotorsports.com) for bailing me out with the JDM 4-1 (complete with heatshields); I owe ya big time






Modified by Kengs at 10:38 AM 5/26/2006

 

Me thinks it's because your motor be rockin back and forth.... what engine mounts are you running?

This is often the case when there's too much fore/aft movement without a header brace that is usually found on stock headers.

tough break....literally....but if anybody can fix it...it's Dave....

 

Do u have a flexpipe?

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by RagingAngel &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Me thinks it's because your motor be rockin back and forth.... what engine mounts are you running?
</TD></TR></TABLE>

Pat,

Ironically enough, I am running Spoon motor mounts They're stiff but not crazy stiff.

And no flex pipe.

 

wow, that's gotta be the first one I've seen or heard do that.

Funny about the spoon motor mounts too

Maybe it will be a good idea to buy a flex pipe to go with that header.

Could it be affected by salt/snow/moisture?

Props to ed for always coming through

 

Oy! That sucks, Shane

Chance that the stainless is a bit more brittle than a milder steel? How many miles on the header?

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Splat &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">Oy! That sucks, Shane

Chance that the stainless is a bit more brittle than a milder steel? How many miles on the header?</TD></TR></TABLE>

No doubt, the Spoon weighs probably 4-5lbs less than the JDM ITR 4-1 (with heatshields).

I bought the header used from Ben @ AJR a couple of years ago, it came off his old EK hatch, was in mint condition when purchased. I've put maybe 25,000 miles on it.

 

knock on wood....I haven't had any issues with most aftermarket headers I've had on the car with my only piece to control engine r0ckage being a prothane rear mount.

It reduced the movement significantly when it was on the dyno without turning the car into a 200whp (I wish ) black & decker *****.

The Spoon mounts could use some help there in that department since Chayen's car uses them and they do get tired over time.

The ball type/donut gasket/flange (holy english batman) on the stock/Spoon header should provide enough "flex" but I guess in your case....you just give too much 3rd gear vTEch and produced a Spoon crackpipe....

 

I don't think the spoon has anti reversion chambers from what I remember. They just weld larger tubing on for the slip joint that they then weld up versus expanding the tubing for a standard slip joint.

There looks to be another crack starting onthe other side of the O2 bung.



The big crack started at the the base of the O2 sensor bung and traveled down each side of the tube. It could have been just a very light weld bead there or the weld was bad if it wasn't purged. We've gotten to the point where we even back purge when welding the O2 bungs. Some may not believe us, but we do. We also purge when doing the weld at the flange and the step in the primaries. Here's a pic of the purge set up.



When this is used very little polishing is needed on the ID of thetube at the weld. Because even if you get signs of the weld coming through it will always be smooth and not be bumpy and extend above the material surface due to the oxides forming. Remember those bad little oxides that form when one doesn't purge?

Non purge on the right, purged on the left side.



Kengs - if it's done this already, it will probably do it again starting someplace else. I think the only thing that could be done with it is to turn it into a long tube sequentially paired 4-2-1. But it would end up looking like a hytech piece so it may be better for you to have Hytech convert it.

 

damn...sorry to see Shane. Glad you got a replacement in teh meantime. BTW you get them springs yet??

 

you used spring stud/bolt at the header and cat/test pipe right?

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by Last For One &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">you used spring stud/bolt at the header and cat/test pipe right?</TD></TR></TABLE>

Affirmative

 

Well if nothing else it sounds like you have some good advice to follow. Interesting that it cracked like it did, but at least you found a replacement in the meantime.

 

well, my say is it's probably time for a new header, you can almost count on that one having 40-50,000 miles on it, the heat in combination of the rocking of the motor for that many miles seems pretty stressfull for anything. new SMSP unit seems fit

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by JUN.R &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote"> new SMSP unit seems fit </TD></TR></TABLE>

More like Honda Fit....

Oh pOopz...did I say too much?

 

man. i hate seeing headers snap..

i hope my AN R dont crack

sorry to see that

 

Anytime Shane

 

you flat out need a flex pipe if you are going to gun it all the time, if this is your DD i mean. If its a track only car(which i doubt) then dont worry

your engine is going to flex, no matter what, you turn a corner and your exaust is going to bend and flex, it is nearly impossible to keep a solid metal tube with bends and holes in it to keep from breaking during driving.. cornering, fast starts, extended highway driving... all of that has to do with it, a flex pipe is needed... spring loaded bolts are not enough

 

ah mang, that's the suck

 

Wow, sorry to see that, dude. Thanks for posting though as it gives me something to think about if I start hearing rice krispies!!!

 

Fugg man that sucks What car is this on? I thought the Si was gone???

 

Oh Snaps! That looks pretty bad. Although it sounds like you've got it covered, I've got a stock ITR header sitting around the house should you ever need to borrow it.

 

You're not alone Shane, I have these same cracks on my Spoon piece:



I saw it starting to happen about a year ago and just decided to look at the header more often when doing oil changes. Thank god I kept the old header just in case.

I am running stock motor mounts so I'm not sure how much that comes into play. But as we know the Spoon header doesn't have the bracket like the stock unit has. Maybe that has the slightest something to do with the cracks? Dunno.

Keep me advised as I'll be heading down a similar path soon enough.

 

my spoon header does not have this problem. is it possible that your exhaust systems have something to do with it? maybe it doesnt line up like it should, putting more stress on the header? I noticed when I pulled my header/exhaust, that the exhaust was actually tucked up closer to the car, pulling the header towards the car, rather than pulling down on it towards the ground. I was using the stock exhaust at the time and have since moved on to a different setup entirely.

 

I would definetly buy a test pipe. A similar problem happened to a local kid around here. He ran the header directly to the test pipe and the rest of the exhaust. There just needs to be compliance, given the motor rocks back and forth.