Stainless Vs Mild steel Turbo headers

[mustang1991]

How long will mild steel turbo headers last with a 91mm set up? What is the advantage to stainless other than life expectancy? Does jet hot coating work on mild steel in turbo application as far as life expectancy goes?

Thanks

[jbi66]

I think it comes down to want you want to spend. My old tubo kit was all ms with a 8 inch flex in the crossover and the tubo mounted by a bracket to my frame rail. I put a few hundred street miles on it and mid 10 second passes without a problem. On the other side, Ive personally seen a Kooks ss collector crack after about 1/2 season of racing. This was in a low 8 second car which used motor plates. I also built a motor for a local kid who used an HP turbo kit which I believe was all ms and jet hot sterling coated. This is the only vehicle he has to drive everyday and has yet to have any sort of cracking issues or flaking of the jet hot. Hope this helps.

Ken

[Sean Knighton]

I believe the wall thickness of the SS or MS will probably dictate the lifespan of the tubing, the coatings have hardness properties that will certainly lessen the effects of heat cycle as well. Another thing to take into consideration is workharding of the metal from vibrations in the system,different Hz will work the metal harder. Good luck with your project.

[possessed 1]

stainless is the way to go with a turbo setup it takes the heat alot better then the mild steel will , most or all big turbo guys use stainless

[timneagroup]

Stainless is nice, but MS is just as good whn a coating is applied. Skip the silver coating it can't handle the heat and will turn flat. Use the black coating that is good to 2000. I had a company called Process Coatings do my MS headers and they used a black coating on the outside and a reddish coating on the inside.

[BOOSTED FLAMER]

Young's Performance fabbed my turbo headers. All ss, no flex in the crossover and not support bracket for the turbo. It's only a PT88 but they said I shouldn't have any problems with cracking. We shall c !!

[forcefed88]

Stainless steel expands at a greater rate than mild steel, thus more prone to cracking. A coated mild steel header will make very close to as much power as a stainless, less likely to crack, easier to fix if they do. I have seen and heard of many outlaw cars with 4-5 years on mild steel stuff.

[dragradialman]

Stainless steel expands at a greater rate than mild steel, thus more prone to cracking. A coated mild steel header will make very close to as much power as a stainless, less likely to crack, easier to fix if they do. I have seen and heard of many outlaw cars with 4-5 years on mild steel stuff.


I agree with the above. I have some old cartech mild steel headers that are almost 10 years old.No problem so far and have re-coated them only once.