heat shields/ header wrap

i-wagon

i-wagon

Well-known member
so for the past month or so I've gotten really annoyed with a heat shield rattle at high idle when I first start my car and around 3000 rpm. after consulting joel I got under the car and got angry at some shields, and got all but the ones on the manifold. the bolts are all rusted to crap and look hard to get at. anyone got any ideas/ experience with ripping these off on a 2007 2.5i? also, I was considering header wrap when all is said and done, wondering if anyone had advice for that as well

 
well, as far as those heat shields go, you might have better luck ripping them off once the manifold has been taken off the car. as far as header wrap goes, its pretty straighfoward.

any heat you keep inside your exhaust, isn't going in your engine bay. always a bonus

 
headers are off the car, all materials there and waiting, just having issues getting all the shields off. if only I had cutting torches:sad:. I left the car in my dads garage and I'm riding my motorcycle, but if I don't have it together by sunday night....I might need backup

 
im willing to bet you have a drill
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just use a bit about the size of the bolts holding the shields on. drill out the shank if you can, if not, drill off the head, and you should be able to pull the shield off.

 
Sawzall works too!!! Just cut off the bolt flanges on one side and then bend them away from the pipe

 
I would suggest ceramic coating over wrap for new england if you have a second car to borrow while the headers are out getting coated

 
as of this moment the headers are wrapped and the silicone coaing is drying. it isn't gorgeous but it looks ok. i ended up both using vise-grips and bending some tabs back and forth till they broke free of one side, and angle grinder on the more stubborn ones:)

ceramic coating? expensive or time consuming? i have a motorcycle to ride if the weather's nice, or if worse comes to worse borrow the brother-in-laws 97 outback limited:-D

 
ceramic coating is around $100 for a 4cyl header. it has similar heat sheilding to wrapping but won't trap moisture and rot the pipes. you can always snag a performance header or a stocker off craigslist/NESIC/ebay and do that over the winter and install in the spring.

 
that's always a possibility. I got it all back together, and achieved the results that were most important and the reason I did it in the first place. 100X less heat shield rattle:). pm me imfo on a place that does it please?

 
so how long should my car smoke for? after I got it back together I took it to go get gas and looks like my radiator blew up because the wrap is smoking so bad...... how long before it stops?

 
how long did you let the spray dry before you started the car up?

you usually need 12 hrs for the VHC's to disapate to a point where it isn't flamable.

and after that you typically let the car idle for 30 min to slowly bake the stuff on, then take it for a little drive.

 
I let it dry for 4 hours. Let the car sit outside for a few more. then drove it on two ten minute trips. It has kind of stopped smoking now but it still stinks.

 
oh well....score 1 for forced drying:p I got a few stares at tractor supply.... " what ails that thing?"

it's done smoking now, and almost doesn't stink, i'll see how it does on the way to west paris later, thanks pedro

 
this header wrap stuff, its a million posts long all over the net.

I took some off an old sube, terrible idea, the engines are frigid and the heat was welcome..and it gets so cold in maine the engine would lose power going through the wind, and never warm up. I sprayed woodstove paint and it works. Part of heat retention is electrical conductivity. Take it away and it is a suffocater of some physic, keeping heat.

I like the metal wraps, only use half of one on each side, when pipes go level after the curves, I keep them open. I am at a point now to make my own if need be.

 
bumpage. was under my car changing my oil taday, and the wrap seemed loose, got home from my dads, it stunk and was smokey. looked down between the engine and radiator, the wrap was kinda shredding itself and falling apart. should i just put it on the lift at work and rip it off, or try again?

 
If you have wrapped headers in maine, I highly recommend an aluminum skid plate, just to keep snow and water from splashing onto the hot headers (and trapping moisture).

You can buy some kind of header coating from summit racing. It is the same stuff that grimmspeed uses. It is cheaper than real ceramic coating.

FYI to other folks. A quick fix for rattling heat shields are those big U-bolt clamps sold in the exhaust isle of autoparts stores. Just wrench on one to clamp your heat shield quiet.

I have borla headers on my 97 OBS. On more than one occasion I have plowed snow with the hot headers. I have a feeling that might have contributed it cracking!?

 
FYI to other folks. A quick fix for rattling heat shields are those big U-bolt clamps sold in the exhaust isle of autoparts stores. Just wrench on one to clamp your heat shield quiet.
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way too easy. i'll look into the spray coating

 
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