Anyone here have a high mileage 355 with original headers??

my valve guides are original and fine. the car has 38,000 miles. the headers went at 26,000 miles, though.

 

My car's headers died around 33k when PO had it. Replaced w/ Fabspeed & no problem so far.

 

My 1997 355 had about 90,000 km (about 56,000 miles) when I sold it, and still had the original headers and valve guides...

No problem.

Mike

 

Not high milage at all.....

Just shy of 13k on my car, all original except tires....

 

Just under 25K and all original. '98 spider

 

Headers and valve guides both replaced around 15k miles and 5 years. Second headers replaced by myself because I wasn't going to wait for them to die at 37k miles on car (22k on those headers).

 

No indication headers have been changed on my car, 50k miles. Receipts going back 20k miles and 8.5 years show no header replacement. Valve guides were done in '05 at 30k miles.

 

Original valve guides at just over 40K miles but the headers died around 28K miles. I'll be shocked if you can find more than 1-2 cars with any mileage (30K+) that are still on original headers but I've been wrong before.

 

32000 km all original headers and guides....

 

21k miles, original headers. I suspect how long headers will last depends on how hard the car is driven. Header temps go up if you drive hard or track your car.

 

36,640 with OEM headers and guides.

 

Headers replaced at 27000 miles with remanufactured headers from QV and I suspect I have to go with another set now at 47000 miles !! Left hand side ticking and I'm getting a faint smell of exhaust gasses when the car is started. There has been so much debating on this site re headers I don't know what to put on!!!

 

valve guides done last winter, headers still fine, over 60,000 miles.

 

Currently working on Major Service on my 1997 F355 Spider....41,xxx miles....Original guides and headers.....Will be testing both during the service

 

Just replaced mine at 37k with Fabspeed headers and they are terrific. Check engine 1-4 light came on and local dealer diagnosed the issue.

 

Owners with so called perfect, ok, no problem headers etc. How are you making those diagnosis?

 

If you have bad factory headers, replace them! If you have good factory headers, replace them! Then put your good headers on a shelf next to pictures of Bigfoot and the Lochness Monster.

 

NEED FEDBACK

I have a 99 355 and mine failed at 60K, I live in Cali, so heres the choice...

Do I go with Fabspeed or do a swap with Ricambi for a set of Refurbed originals?

What would I be better off in the long run...

 

first sorry for your loss. the problem in the people republic of Kalifornia is that the smog laws are getting tougher. The new "star" stations are billed as the new smog nazi's. If so they will fail you on the visual so the best option might be qv london repipes with use of original ferrari heat shields or the new claimed stock headers of "higher" quality. These new headers have a new part number ask dan and ricambi. The jury is still out if these are indeed improved. No aftermarket header to my knowledge carries a cali EO number to make them legal. This also includes cats. There are no aftermarket smog legal cats either. You can pass the snif test with these in place but not the visual tests. This problem is going to make a whole lot of out of kali 355's have one less state to sell these cars in.

 

From my experience and from talking to my mechanic, who has worked on these cars since they were new, both as a factory trained Ferrari technician and later on as an independent, the headers all end up developing cracks or fissures after 30 or 40,000 kms. The trouble is that you can't see the failure through the factory shields, that cover the actual headers.

On simple inspection, things may look great, and if you don't know how to diagnose it, the car also seems to run well. This is exactly what I thought when the engine was taken out for the recent major I performed. The headers looked fine and I was wondering why my mechanic was insisting I change them. He gained nothing except a few hours of labor as the option he suggested was sending the headers to a specialist in the UK that apparently does an amazing job of reconditioning them (Stainless Steel Exhausts | Custom Made Stainless Exhaust Specialist - no affiliation!) and is a much cheaper option than Fabspeed, Capristo, etc. They recondition them fully and in theory never have any more problems (again, in my mechanics experience).

So how did he diagnose it? When the engine was on at idle, he heard the sound slightly off, as if the noise "rolled"...anyway, it's hard to explain the sound, but when he confronted me with it, I accepted to fix them. When the headers were removed, he showed me the beginning of slight cracks in the shield and sure enough, after lifting the shield slightly, the headers didn't look too good.

After the major and the reconditioned headers, (yes, I know the car got new oils, filters and correct timing to the mm, but still), the car sounds VERY different and completely smooth at idle. I had noticed nothing before and had put around 800 miles on her before the major.

So, a word of warning, if you have more than 40,000 kms, think about changing your headers, despite the car "feeling" right...it'll feel way better with new ones and avoid potential damage in the future.

My 2 cents.

 

Your post is what I was getting at. You have made a very important "2 cents."

People's diagnosis is sketchy at best. A smoke test is so easy and so telling. even a garage rat like me has a smoke tester.

 

I agree with smoke testing. Pretty simple to make a smoke tester. Lots of ideas on You tube:
[ame=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RhLDR5x-89I]DIY smoke machine - YouTube[/ame]