Front header's cracked . . . engine's coming out?

*golf clap*

It took me six months to work up the nerve to START! LOL!

 

Yep, know that one well, anguishing over the task for longer than it actually takes.

 

Nice work!!

 

Hi
your engine shouldn't be moving that much. As someone else asked, is the rear brace in place and if so, is hte bushing in 1 piece? The 2 holes in the bushing should be on top/bottom, not front/rear.

Gerrit, thankful everyday that he has a Euro car, so much less junk on it.

http://dino308gt4.com

 

daughter, and her GF,.... you be the man, are they over 21 and single ? ...

LMAO,

 

Movement is side to side . . . as in passenger to driver . . . I don't think that top engine strut would help this so I think the motor mounts are f'd . . . wouldn't suprise me . . . utube donuts to follow when it's back on the road (tomorrow hopefully) . . . bzzzzzzzz



Sean

 

After other discussions on the 308 exhaust, when I put it back together last time I used stainless bolts with brass nuts and exhaust springs to attach all the flanges. That whole thing moves around and flexes under acceleration, decceleration and corning, and if you dont leave it any give anywhere it can put a lot of stress on those parts. The later cars used springs, supposedly for that very reason.

 

My engine doesn't have too much junk on it either.
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I'm going to try and anneal with a torch after it's re-welded. Any tips? I've got a head for a weld fixture also.

Sean

 

Well, carreaper at the time they were both about 12 years old, so fit together in the passenger seat of the 308GTB.......LOL!

They are 16 now, and starting to buy party dresses.....sigh...like her Mom wore all those years ago...

I think you'd be better suited for my oldest girl, whose 23.... in Lawrence Kansas!

I'll post a pic from home.....

And now back to our blown header repair thread....that's actually a good idea to try get a low mileage set from a wreck in Europe.

Yea, artvonne that's exactly what I was talking about on the F40 they had a spring on the bolts, to allow some flexibility at that junction, I've seen the set on 328s as well, dunno if OEM or retrofit....

I was gonna assemble something at the local Ace Hardware, or maybe Ricambi has the sets now......

 

hey Bubba, by the way, was it a rich condition causing excessive fuel in the exhaust that caused your failure?

i have a friend with an older 308 and his pipes glow on one bank when driven hard, but i swear its lean and not rich. it would be nice to know a root cause for these header failures, or pool our information and try to prevent the failures. i bet the heads dont like to be heated up like that, sure to cause a valve to fail, or a valve seat to come loose.

we dont need or have cats on our older cars here, good thing too , the way these cars burn!

 

I had two MSDs installed by a prior owner, routed thru an undersized relay and wired with a lamp cord.........in parallel for sure, but STILL an 18AWG lamp cord....

MSD info reflected #10AWG wiring mininum....

Long story short the relay was cutting out on overtemp, then once cool would turn the ignition back 'on'...on the freeway that'd would throw a flame about five feet out the tips....

Poor headers were subjected to the stress of a pipe bomb! So they gave up!

I blew a chunk out at the collector about six inches across and lit the fan belts and all rubber tubing against the RH fuel tank on fire....

Putting mine back together as lucky is doing was not an option.....

The first one was $250 used, the second one $700 used, so the market is rising on our parts, as well!

 

I doubt Vern Cornell would have done that MSDs that way, must have been John Kane, down in Miami.....

JRV threw it all away, although later on he warmed to the MSD equipment for some applications...

"You are just lighting a teaspoon of gas, Alan ...ya don't need to use a flamethrower to do it!"

The jetting was way off on the car due to a manifold vacuum leak someone was compensating for........we found that and returned the jetting to Factory specs.......

"This car was running well when it left Italy, don't you think, Alan?"

I miss that cranky guy, every day.......

 

It came out in two peices? So, are the pipes not connected at the head flange? On my old car (308 QV euro), the header head flange was one piece (see picture) so I didn't need to worry about alignment when I had mine welded after a crack.

The reason I bring it up, is whomever welds yours back together needs to make sure it will line up flush your head, and the holes line up with the studs. Maybe it's no big deal, but it would not be fun to have exhaust leaks after all this is done. New copper gaskets should take care of any problems.

Just curious more than anything else about the differance in US and euro 308's.
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the lamp cord had me ROTFLMAO.... where the hell do you find these cars?


with 3 now to keep alive , you must have 3 jobs!

 

I cut the header in half to get to the offending break.

Doesn't look like it's going to be too painful.
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It's welded and going back in tomorrow or tonight if I get motivated.

 

She's back on the road . . . thinking about motor mounts now.


Thanks again for the input . . . glad I didn't need to pull the motor.


Sean

 

Anytime, brudda.........