I heard from a local Evo owner that Megan Racing uses cheaper Chinese steel and that his MR exhaust cracked....might be warry about anything that isn't made with USA stainless 304 steel.

 

We sell the megan header and o2 housing here. We do not sell it for its massive power gains, but for the customer who doesn't want a turbo kit and still wants some bling under the hood. The gains are very minimal 1-2 whp but I have not seen nor heard of them cracking.

 

Thanks Frank. That is kind of the way I'm looking at it. I would like to make some gains along with the bling though ... =) That 1-2 hp you've seen ... is that with supporting mods or on a fully stock car?

 

Those are with supporting mods.

 

did you notice any gains with the ported manifold? also, what kind of precautions did you take to protect your FR manifold? my friends recommended that I weld support brackets to the o2 housing and use a mani shield to protect it from rain if I ever get one... I heard good things about FR and JIC.

 

The stock manifold and O2 housing flow very well from the factory, its hard to improve on a well designed piece.

 

did you guys ever test some of the better manifolds such as JIC or FR against stock? I had decided not to get a manifold, but I got most other stuff that gives decent power. thinking about JIC or FR mani along with APS or AMS IC.

Do you have to trim the undershield to fit the AMS IC?

 

We have not tested other stock turbo aftermarket manifolds.

The undershield does have to be trimed very slightly in order to fit the AMS ic

 

You guys have not found much power with aftermarket o2 housings?

 

I think u may have misread warr's post. Basically he is saying UNLESS you pay 900 for a full race mani, you'd be buying a crap manifold that will crack and not make power. I dont think he is saying anything negative about the full race except the price.

To be honest I can't really see why anyone is charging 900 bucks for a turbo header either. I mean really good exhaust builder charge 1100 or so for full length headers on all motor cars which require more welding and more material and I'm not talking about budget work either. John at Hytech even charges about 1300 for a full length CUSTOM all motor header, these manifolds take about 1/3 of the material and are off the shelf pieces........so I dont think the 900 dollar price tag is worth it at all. They should be in the 5-700 range at max.

 

I just bolted it to the head. No brackets, no O2 support bracket... If you saw one you would be pretty confident it wont break. I have no splash gaurd in my CF hood either so it sees plenty of rain. I picked up close to 10HP and saw my knock volts drop in my logs after. I can't explain that part or attribute it to the manifold, maybe better gas but I alwasy fill up at the same Sunoco. I do have a lot of other supporting mods.

 

we also like the megan manifold for looks and minimal power gains for minimal price...

the o2 housing is worth doing with any manifold at the same time. its a fairly nice and easy install

cb

 

It could be a grammatical/comprehension error, so I apologize if it was.
Many people can cut steel and weld it together to make a part. Full Race is a group of bright engineers that spend far more time designing and testing a part to perform as best as possible before selling it to the public. I develop products for a living and appreciate the time and cost of R&D that is often overlooked. After seeing the material thickness and the quality of the welds inside and out at SEMA last year and I came to the conclusion that the $900 price was more than fair. It is nice to see a company care about what they sell instead of going to China and making a quick buck. I have a policy of investing in quality and buying things once, to each there own.

 

I think what Warr was getting at is those blingy exhaust manifolds only look nice for a week. Then they turn into a sh!ty brown and blue eye sore.

So why would you want to add a part that is:
1. Likely to fail
2. Makes less power
3. Will look like **** in a week

You are better off keeping the stocker and getting a blingy heat shield for it.

 

Bill, sorry for the confusion. I was not talking bad about the FR manifold at all. I was saying that is the ONLY one that I recommend in place of porting/coating the stock manifold. It's only downside is the price tag. It is too expensive to use on a stock turbo'd car, imo, because the $/hp is outlandish. In dyno testing on the same car with lots of mods, it made 4whp more than the ported stocker without losing any torque or power anywhere else in the powerband. This made it superior to the stock ported manifold, but not by much, and certainly not worth the extra $700, imo. The FR unit is high quality unlike the Megan and others like it, which is why I say to either get the stocker ported/coated or go all out and get the FR, depending on the purchaser's checkbook size.