headers vs. intake manifold

jshelton2006

New Member
Oct 30, 2006
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Indiana
i have a 95 mustang gt with bbk cai, o/r h pipe, american thunder catback, and msd ignition in the performance category. next i plan on either headers or intake, but im not sure which - $$ is an issue so i need either one or the other for now. which would be best and give me more power with my car? i know an edelbrock intake claims to give 37 hp at 5500 rpms, how much do headers add? Also what headers are best? I have looked at hookers. I want LTs, so which brand are easiest to install? As far as intake i am looking at either trick flow or edelbrock. Anyone know power gains on any of this? Thanks a lot
 
I wnet headers first strictly because my factory studs were broken and I got headers used for $100.

I would say that headers are cheaper but an intake is more bang for the buck, or so I have heard...
 
It would be helpful if you gave us some kind of idea about your long term goals for the car.

I say that cause you have plainly said money is an issue so you only wanna buy a part once that will fit into those plans.

Like do you want an intake with the longest runner street upper
or
One with mid length runners because it might fit better with h/c/i

About your header Q's .................

BBK or Mac LT's will be about the same as far as installation goes so pick either one. You can find peeps say good or bad about each brand.

From the general all around info given ....................

I'd throw in with all my other SN buds and agree about doing the intake first.
HOWEVER
You would be wise to look into which upper would be better for what you wanna do or where you wanna go with your Stang :)

Grady
 
94tang said:
you wont get a whole lot more power out of either one of them,but the intake would be the better choice
I would disagree with that. Headers wont get you much, but an intake manifold will. I gained 3mph in the quarter just from an Edel Performer. Huge difference there. Its in my top 3 or 4 mods that made me faster.
 
Like Grady said. Think about your overall goal for your car. Then, if like me, you have to budget your mods you won't waste money buying the wrong parts.

That said, I bought my headers first ONLY because they were the ones I had planned on buying and the price was right. Unused ceramic coated equal length BBKs for $260 'buy it now' on ebay was a deal I couldn't pass up. They didn't do anything but look good until I did the heads and X-pipe.

For me heads was the biggest HP gain. Followed by the intake and then X-pipe. Headers would come after those.
 
don't forget though that long tube headers will require you to ditch your o/r h-pipe in favor of a shorter midpipe to go with the long tubes. it's not a direct bolt on like an intake is.

i would look in the classifieds on here and over on the corral.net. you can get some really good deals on intakes and used parts in general.
 
Ok i'll make this even easier, you have stock headers right now and you want full length, which means your also going to need a midpipe, computing the cost of headers and midpipe, (used) your looking at 300 - 350 (good deal) and this is assuming your doing the work. You can get a used performer for about 300 - 350, unless you get a great deal, and I believe you get more out of the intake on a basically stock car.
 
Now that is a question you can answere yourself, What are your goals? A certain goal will get you different answere's. Here's an example : I wanted my 94 to be a road race car, so I am going with a setup that makes power higher in my RPM band, so I let Ed C. know where I wanted my power to be, got the heads set up for the cam specks, and topped it with an intake that will perform the best with the other two. Ok now with that being said, on your current setup, a Edelbrock performer will work just fine, and it's actually a pretty good intake with heads and a cam. So is the trick flow track heat, or it might be the street heat? I'm not too familiar with the trick flow stuff. It's comperable to the performer. I have no experience with the RPM II, but I got the regular RPM for my setup, And I have heard good things about the RPM II, not sure about a stock setup for that one though.

jshelton2006 said:
Ok which intake would work best? Edelbrock performer or trick flow? Eventually i want to put heads and cam in it, but that wont come until i get the money.