Torque Monster Headers: Installation Writeup and Review

Introduction
I spent the past weekend installing a new set of Tech Performance and Engineering's Torque Monster Headers on my Mountaineer. This post and thread will evolve over the next few days as a photo-documented "how-to" guide on installation of the headers, and a subsequent review of how they fit and how the performance of the Mountaineer has been increased. I will be editing this first post as the installation guide, the second post will the review. After that, let the comments begin!

Welded on TP&E logo, pass side header

Why Headers?
I had the stock manifolds out of the truck last June for my valve-job and head gasket repair (see: http://www.explorerforum.com/forums/showthread.php?t=108712 ) and could not believe how restrictive the design was. I had wanted headers at that point, but they were impossible to find. I am also always looking for bolt-on performance mods to increase the V8's power and/or gas mileage. While a supercharger may be the "ultimate" bolt on, bolting one on a 8 year old, 125k mile engine isn't the greatest recipe for reliability. A cam swap would mean discharging the A/C and substantial downtime. Headers on the otherhand, can be bolted on in a weekend, will increase power, and will not harm reliability. They are also a part that can be grown into, should I decide to cam or supercharge down the road (and would be a necessity anyway with said mods.)

Although the FMS headers were just re-released, they are very close in design to the stock manifolds, while the new Torque Monster headers are a much cooler design, with some neat technology behind them.

Tools Requied
Besides the usual compliment of wrenches, a few speciaity tools are needed. Don't make emergency parts runs like I did!

- A copious amount of 3/8" socket extensions and a good u-joint.
- 1/4" to 3/8" and 3/8" to 1/2" socket adapters.
- A good torque wrench.
- An 18mm offset wrench, for tightening the engine mount nuts.


Installation
(You'll have to excuse the salt, dirt, and surface rust. The weather has been really bad up here in Boston latley. Stay tuned for the big underbody painting thread come springtime.)

1) Jack up the truck, and support the lower a-arms or frame on jackstands. Remove wheels and fenderwell linings.


Passenger side fenderwell removed

Driver's side fenderwell removed

2) Remove the 13mm bolt that connects the steering shaft. This will allow the lower section of the shaft to be rotated out of the way during installation.


Steering shaft bolt

3) Remove all ignition wires and sparkplugs. Take the wires, and any mounting brackets completely off the engine. You'll be re-routing them once the headers are installed.

4) Remove manifold to downpipe bolts. There are two per manifold, and can be a pain to reach. U-joints and long extensions are a must.

Driver's side downpipe to manifold bolts. View looking up, camera placed next to front driveshaft.

5) Begin to remove the driver's side exhaust manifold to head bolts. Some are studs, some are nuts. The dipstick, bolted onto cylinder seven's aft stud, just pulls straight out from its hole in the block.


Dipstick assembly

6) Remove the driver's side exhaust manifold. With the steering shaft pointing vertical, it will wiggle out underneith the brake booster.


Removing the driver's side exhaust manifold, side view


Top View

7) With the manifold removed - compare it to the new header. My jaw dropped.




Collector Compasion, stock stamped vs. TM Modified Merge



Stock header


Torque Monster Ports

Driver's side manifold removed

8) Install driver's side header. The header comes in two parts, allowing easier installation around the steering shaft and fuel lines.
a. sperate the #5 cylinde tube from the header.
b. Insert the main header piece at the rear of the motor.
c. Drop in the #5 cylinder connector.
d. put one bolt in each header peice, then bolt the two together. It is important to loosely bolt the headers to the head before bolting the flange together.


Completed driver's side header


Driver's side Torque Monster Header top view

9) Re-attach dipstick. It will just press into fit, and then can be bolted down with the other 8 header bolts. Normally, a threaded stud will hold the header to the block, and the dipstick will be bolted speratly to the stud. However, the header tube is so close to the stud, the larger nut will not fit on. My dipstick is temporarily bolted below the stud's main nut, untill a smaller nut can be obtained.


Dipstick re-installed


Dipstick top view

10) Torque down all 8 header to head bolts, and the two flange connection bolts. Do NOT connect the header to the downpipe at this point, flexibility is needed when the motor is subsequently lifted from its passenger side mount.

11) Begin to disassemble the passenger side for header installation. Disconnect the MAF, IAT, and crankcase breather from the air intake tube, then remove the intake tube. Remove the air filter and MAF. Lastly, unbolt the bracket that supports the MAF/airbox and the foglight realy. Put it aside, there is no need to remove the foglight relay.


MAF support bracket. I have re-located the climate control vacuum reserve sphere to the upper fender, rather than have it be attached to the fenderwell lining. This 'mini-mod' was done last year during my aux trans filter install.

12) Remove the lower EGR tube-to-manifold connection. I used an adjustible wrench, as none of my combination wrenchs were large enough. Your miliage may vary.


Lower EGR tube-to-manifold nut

13) Remove the EGR vacuum hoses and the upper EGR nut.


Upper EGR nut

14) Remove the passenger side manifold-to-downpipe connection. I have liberally applied PB-Blaster to the bolt threads.


Passenger side exhaust manifold

15) Remove the 8 manifold-to-head bolts, then remove the manifold. On the passenger side, the manifold is removed through the front of the engine compartment, above the A/C line and below the airbox's normal location.

Passenger side manifold removal


Manifold removed

16) Comparison shots! Unlike the driver's side, the passenger header is one peice, and the tubes are almost equal in length.



Passenger comparison, including port size.

17) Since the header's tubes straddle the engine mount nuts, the engine must be lifted 1" to allow the header to clear. The engine mount nuts are 18mm, and heavily torqued down. I used PB-Blaster, and a deep-well socket. I put a 2ft breaker bar (steel pipe) over the end of my Craftsman ratchet to gain enough leverage to break the nuts free. Notes:
a.The driver's side mount does not need to be touched.
b. Section525 did not have to complete this step because of his body lift raising the heaterbox 3" out of the way.

Passenger side engine mount nuts soaked in PB-Blaster

Do not remove the nuts, but merely bring them to the top of the motor mount studs. Through trial and error, I found the exact height of the nuts to be crucial. Don't go past the studs, or getting a wrench in to re-tighten them is impossible.

Nuts raised to their optimal height

18) Place a solid 2x4 block between the oil pan and a floorjack. Carefully jack up the motor untill the mount plate is touching the raise motor mount nuts.

Jacking up motor.


Engine raised.

19) Insert the header using the reverse procedure of the manifold's removal. This is where the header install gets tricky, and the part I had the most difficulty with. The header will clear the accessory bracket, forward upper control arm camber nut, shock tower and heaterbox. However, it must be finnessed into place, and then tipped back end down, forward end up to clear the motor mount nuts. If the exhaust downpipe is too far forward or inflexible, it will prevent this tilt. I coult not get the header to fit. While trading digital photos and talking on the phone with Robert Pasquale, Torque Monster's owner and the header's designer, we established that my downpipe was in the way. I then de-coupled the two downpipes (passenger and driver) from the rear cats and muffler, and wiggled the assembly aft.

The downpipes are held on by two bolts per pipe. They will most likley be very rusty and seized, and need to be ground off. While this proved to be the solution on my truck, I am the only Torque Monster Header installer who has had to do this step... oh I love this truck.


Pass side downpipe disonnected

Due to my trial-and-error on inserting the header, I unfortunatley put some scratches in the ceramic coating, and wiped some rust-colored PB-Blaster on the headers. In the next photo, you can see how the tubes straddle the motor mount nuts.

Scratched tubes

20) With the downpipe loose, the header has plenty of wiggle room. Once it is into position, and straddling the motor mount nuts, lower the motor back down onto its mount.


Header straddling nuts




Passenger header almost in


21) Re-tighten the engine mount nuts. The forward nut is easily accessible. The rear nut is a huge PITA, and can only be reached with an offset wrench. This tighetening took a very long time, and required holding the header up and out of the way, while taking miniscule turns on the wrench. These nuts are supposed to be torqued to 95ft-lbs; since I wasn't able to get a torque wrench on them, I just pulled until I couldn't pull anymore!


Tightening engine mount nuts

22) Insert the exhaust header gasket from the front. Bob supplies gaskets, bolts, and even the locktite needed with the headers.

Inserting gasket

23) Bolt up the header to the head. Normal procedure suggests that the outer two bolts be done first, but the extreme tube configuration means that the forward bolt on cylinder #4 needs to be inserted first.


Initiall bolting

24) Once the header bolts are properly torqued down to 30ft-lbs, re-install the sparkplugs. Here again, u-joints and extensions are a necessity.


Sparkplug installation

25) Now a fun project begins: Reshaping the EGR tube to accept the headers.


Original 1997 EGR shape




EGR final bench bend




EGR tube re-installed

26) Torque Monster stainless steel spark plug heatsheilds, similar to the stock GT40P heatsheilds on cylinders 3-4 and 7-8, these are much thicker and go on all of the cylinders, except #3 - it won't fit due to the bend of the header tube. The old, thin Ford part did fit.

Heatsheilds on passenger side

27) Ignition wire routing: I had purchased a set of 1998 Taylor Spira-Pro 8mm ignition wires from Summit Racing this past spring. I also purchased a set of TransDapt wire standoffs and wirelooms to aid in re-routing the ignition wires away from heat and moving parts. Everything fit really well, but took a few tires to get right, as the new wire layout is far from stock.


Taylor Spira-Pro wire with included heatsheild.

Cylinder 1&2 initial ignition wire routing


Cylinder 3&4 initial ignition wire routing


Passenger side wire routing, with wire heatshields, split-tubing for chafe protection, and wire standoffs.


Driver's side ignition wire routing and wire standoffs


Always label your wires. I didn't and crossed two of them, yeilding a misfire. Don't rush, go slow, and always double check. I've had this ignition system apart many times, and made this stupid error.


Areas to monitor:

The following photo is of the clearance between the #4 primary tube and the A/C system orifice tube. It's less than 1/2", and I have been assured by Bob that this is more than enough clearance. Nevertheless, this is in the 'cold' line of the A/C system, and may hamper performance/soak in excess heat.



More to follow in the next few days

Torque Monster Headers: Review

So how much of a difference do these pipes actually make?

That’s the question on everyone’s mind, and hopefully I can provide a good description for Explorer Forum and interested readers in this post. My impressions of the headers have been extremely positive so far, but I have less than 30 miles on them at this point, some were on highway, most have been in Boston traffic. I will be doing a follow up as I have a chance to play with the truck more.

Startup and Idle: While the engine isn’t pumping much air though the exhaust, the main difference here is a more distinct, meaner, V8 rumble. I am still running the stock exhaust system including the Ford muffler and resonator, so its not any louder.

City Driving: Acceleration is where the headers begin to shine. Normally, while driving around town I will accelerate to 2,000 RPMs, however with the Torque Monster headers, the powerband has been lowered, and I now find myself only having to accelerate to 1,800 RPMs to achieve the same speed and acceleration. At speed acceleration is vastly improved, coming much quicker than before. The truck not only feels peppier, but it feels stronger, and more solid throughout the 2,000-3,000 RPM range.

Highway Driving: The first time I merged onto the highway from an on-ramp, a wide grin appeared on my face, for I could feel that this is where the Torque Monster headers truly shine: heavy acceleration. I do not have hard numbers, but the headers definitely took noticeable time off of my 0-60. Merging on the highway is also improved, and the accelerator is more responsive when climbing from 60-70 MPH. Noise at speed is noticeable only to the trained ear, as the headers do not make the truck louder.

The free-er flowing exhaust system does not appear to have cut into my low-end torque at all, but has definitely improved acceleration. These tests are just 'seat-of-the-pants,' but the performance boost is very noticible in comparison to stock. Initial fuel economy tests using my message center have shown a significant 2 MPG increase since header installation. I am excited to see the long-term results, and will keep everyone posted.

These were definitely a worthwhile mod!

I am wondering if they would interfere with a Powerdyne supercharger?????


NICE WRITE UP!

The headers would work well with a Powerdyne.

Subscribed.

You had to tell me that

Bump with pics and a huge write-up. Great job, Aaron!

now you just have to deal with those 4 catalytic converters

Damn good write up.

This is STICKY material.

Awesome write-up!

Thanks for the compliments.... I hope the pictures aren't too much for those still on dialup.

If you have any questions regarding the headers, post em!

Fantastic review! We all thank you.

On a personal note, I have 2 worries about the TM headers;
1. Re-bending the EGR pipe. This could crack/misalign, and be a general PITA, and I'm worried about screwing it up. Even in the 'instruction video' they managed to foul up the EGR pipe. I'd appreciate more detail on how you got it right on the first try, and how it installed. The 'instruciton video' showed that you needed a custom wrench to install it. What did you use?

2. Heat soak on nearby parts/plug wires. Great thinking on the heat shields/boots on the aftermarket wires and the looms. I would almost think that they would be necessary with the TM header install. But the AC line is scary-close to the tube. I have some temp-paint (as well as an infared temp gun) and would like to know how hot that the manifold is getting when sitting so close to an expensive piece of AC equipment. I'm betting that exhaust tube - at the point closest to the AC line - reaches temps in excess of 800*F. I'd like to see an extra heat shield there.

Thanks again for the great photos and write up!

-Brad

Brad,

I shared/share both your concerns about the install.

1) I feel that Bob should include a new, custom bent EGR tube with the headers. Although I was able to successfully rebend my stock tube, there was a point where I didn't think I could get it to fit, and I also came dangerously close to breaking it/crimping it closed at the upper bend below the intake manifold. I ended up getting the fit pretty close, and then torquing it into place with the nuts. Hasn't leaked, and I don't expect it too. It's totally doable with standard tools - all I used was a vise, a pair of vicegrips, and a nut-driver handle to stick inside the pipe.

2) I have a high-temp thermometer on my MAC multimeter, and will definitley take measurements on the headers and A/C orifice tube. There is currently a 1/2" air gap between them. The headers do have a ceramic coating, which makes a noticable difference in engine bay temperature.

Perhaps I will obtain a heat-sheild for the orifice tube, similar to what is on the heaterbox. The heaterbox heatsheild to header clearance is also about a 1/2," possibly less. Time will tell, however Bob has had these headers on his vehicles for over a year without any difficulty. It's the price we need to pay for performance. Who knows - a 1/2" of clearance might be all we need!

Awesome writeup....although I dont think im capable of doing something like that myself at this point in time. Those headers are definetely on my "things to get before I go broke" list. Any guess as to how much a shop would charge to install?

That is a great write up and definately on my possible future mods list now that I only have 1 car payment left! WOOHOO!

LiKuiD said:

Awesome writeup....although I dont think im capable of doing something like that myself at this point in time. Those headers are definetely on my "things to get before I go broke" list. Any guess as to how much a shop would charge to install?

Click to expand...

It would have to be a custom shop, or one where you know the mechanic/owner and he's got some time. I was able to do the driver's side in about 2 hours, but because of my issues with the passenger side downpipe, I spent countless hours figuring out how to get the header in place. (which included some work that didn't need doing like removing the passenger side accessory drive bracket!! ) Knowing what I know now about unbolting the downpipe at the 2nd set of cats, I bet I could complete the entire install on another Explorer/Mountaineer, start to finish, in about 6-8 hours. With this writeup, I hope that anyone else interested could complete the job in about that long as well.

On a related note, I'm now in the market for a Cat-Back exhaust to round out my exhaust system. How do you like your MAC? I already have their intake.

I ordered the Torque monster headers and I noticed that your OEM headers do no look anything like mine. Mine look more like the Torque monster, but I have the 2000.

I wonder if I am going to notice that much improvement.

compdoc777 said:

I ordered the Torque monster headers and I noticed that your OEM headers do no look anything like mine. Mine look more like the Torque monster, but I have the 2000.

I wonder if I am going to notice that much improvement.

Click to expand...

Matt, you have the same manifolds I have ('98 Explorer 5.0 V8 EB). You will feel a marked difference in your performance. Although your manifolds look a little larger, they still suffer from the same suffication problem as the earlier models as seen in this writeup.

Our base dyno test was stone stock with the later manifolds. After installing our Torque Monster Headers, we showed a 21 hp increase and 35 ft. lbs. of torque and moved the peak torque curve down 200 rpm. Meaning, you will notice a considerable difference throughout the rpm range, from idle to full accelleration.

These Headers are a wake up call for the 5.0 V8 Explorer/Mountaineer.

Bob Pasquale
Tech Performance & Engineering
Torque Monster Headers

Bob Pasquale

What's the status with the headers recieving their CARB certification?

Thanks

-Brad

they are still awaiting CARB status, if you checkl the Torque Monster website he'll keep you updated on that.

My hat goes off to you V8Boatbuilder, Excellent writeup and pictures.
I assume you could also ditch the EGR all together if you wanted to but you didnt hear that from me.

After installing these suckers on my 88 BII with basically a frame and engine I knew it would be quite a job getting them in a Ex, with a big learning curve for the first timer.
But with this design you have shown it is possible in a weekend, good job.
It may be easier to loosen the heater box cover then it is to loosen the engine mount?? However getting at those engine mount bolts is good for you

Keep us updated on the performance you experience The stock manifolds are VERY restrictive, not only are they pinched down to some tiny openings but the design of multiple cylinders firing into a single tube just makes for a very odd exhaust flow, the engine actually has to struggle to push exhaust out = ouch.
the FMS headers, although improved over the stock manifolds still have this design. I imagine anyone who is looking for 5.0L power from this block will want these headers

Customer service also goes a long way in this business and Robert has been top notch in every category, from packaging to support, these headers are worth every penny.

rcpasq said:

Matt, you have the same manifolds I have ('98 Explorer 5.0 V8 EB). You will feel a marked difference in your performance. Although your manifolds look a little larger, they still suffer from the same suffication problem as the earlier models as seen in this writeup.

Our base dyno test was stone stock with the later manifolds. After installing our Torque Monster Headers, we showed a 21 hp increase and 35 ft. lbs. of torque and moved the peak torque curve down 200 rpm. Meaning, you will notice a considerable difference throughout the rpm range, from idle to full accelleration.

These Headers are a wake up call for the 5.0 V8 Explorer/Mountaineer.

Bob Pasquale
Tech Performance & Engineering
Torque Monster Headers

Click to expand...

yeah but you are biased... you sell them! LOL!

My problem is I am going to add a lot of parts at one time. So I will never feel the increase per one unit upgrade. I am going from stock to insanity in one stop. Not that I am saying they won't work I am sure they will work perfectly as stated.