What are those tools that are a must have for doing exhaust work and headers?

I recently got a job to build some exhausts and it's nothing I've ever done before. I'm not even sure where or how to start with figuring out what angles I need. Everything I've done is mostly simple stuff, and/or round or square. Never had to do anything complex so I'm not even sure where to start. How to do I figure out what angles I need and where to go from there?

 

Get a pipefitter guidebook.

And not to sound rude, but if you are not able to fit pipe, why did you take the job? (Unless the customer knows you are using him/her as a learning experience).

 

look at the area you have to work with, tunnel, rear end, etc, and map out what angles will be needed and buy those angles and plenty of straight. if this were something you would be doing almost daily, it would be worth the money to go ahead and get a mandrel bender...but for the moment, you are going to have to use your head to put together a jigsaw puzzle. will require a lot of measuring, cutting, and more than likely some wasted material, but that's what it takes to get the job done.

 

chop saw/bandsaw, carbide grinding bits, belt sander (minimum 4"x36"), eyes, drill press/drill, step drill bits

 

Helping a friend out who is in a pinch, plus I gotta learn sometime.
They know I've never done it before.

I wish, customer gave me U bends and said make it out of that. It's a puzzle for sure!

Any special types of clamps or anything? I find it was very hard to cut a U bend in half on a horizontal/vertical bandsaw. Same with cutting angles.

 

sorta kinda related, but probably not helpful at all...

i used my chopsaw to cut the pieces for the pie cuts i used to make a downpipe for my friends car. all SS 304

on the intercooler piping job (same car, same friend) ive used my portaband to cut the AL piping up.

great post, subscribing cuz Im curious too!

 

It is only a physical geometric shape to fit in a specific location, so look at the u bends, determine what angle is needed, cut from one of them, attach the next length of pipe and there you go, you have a starting point.
Regards
Dave

 

You guys recommend any types of clamps or jig tables or anything like that to hold all these things in odd plates and be easier to work on?

 

Specific kind of paper for the belt sander?

 

Can you post your progress here? Or make anew thread and link it? I'm curious to see how you do.

 

Any type of chop saw you guys recommend? I'm using the evolution rage 2 and it's got a lot of torque. Clamped down some 3" stainless exhaust and clamped it really tight and it still spit the part out. If the part is shorter than 6" there is no chance of it staying in there.

Or is there a good all in one bandsaw/chop saw that would be good for this type of work?

 

I have RAGE 2 as well and love it...however you are right about the clamp. I am soon going to remove that clamp mount and make a dedicated table with clamping and what not just for that chop saw

 

I use a harbor freight chop saw with wheels from SPDexhaust. both standard and stainless cutting wheels. does well.

 

Which one they have a few.
That what you use to cut small tubing for manifolds too?

 

Whatever size your saw requires. I use it for everything. I only have the chop saw. Love to have a nice band saw at one point but that will have to wait

 

Sorry i meant what HF chop saw do you have? They have a 3.5hp and 2hp. Wonder if it matters any. also how do you not crush the pipe when cutting it

 

Been working on this. Got one that fits perfect so I made a jig off of it. The only issue with a jig is you don't know your tolerances for how far off something can be so it needs to be almost the same exact ones every time.
I took the one angled piece i had and held up another pipe to it, marked with it, cut and took my other 2 pieces that i had to line it all up on my jig.
i'd be lying if i said i didn't spend well over an hour just lining up half of it. just those 3 pieces took forever to line up.
Green tape doesn't hold parts in place to tack for nothing.
It's a nightmare to cut angles or U bends on a little bandsaw. Impossible to cut **** straight on a portaband with a table.

Still staring at this jig trying to figure out how in the world i can do the same angle for the next one and so on and so on. I need an easy way to repeat the same cuts over and over again.

Got a new chop saw on the way but that won't solve all my issues.