Ok so i found someone selling this top mount manifold for a pretty good price. Does this look like a good manifold? He says it will work with a/c so i am very interested in buying this. Let me know what you guys think

 

looks decent, hard to tell without bolting it on

 

kinda hard to tell fitment unless its bolted on the car
looks like a nice piece though... who makes it?

 

If its a Fab-Worx piece then its really good, he makes some good manifolds and it fits pretty well, my buddy Ray had it on his car and it made good power.

 

looks nice

 

Being a fabricator/welder I can tell you right now dont buy that manifold. Look in the second picture how bad the head flange is warped... you can see that who ever built this tried to sand it flat and it only hit the few aeras that are clean. So from the looks of it its bowed and twisted from not bolting it down properly while welding it. Things caused by a warped head flange.

#1. Exhaust leaks you cant fix.
#2. Because its not flat, when you bolt it down it puts stress on the runners, add heat and vibrations and it leads to the third thing...
#3. A cracked manifold that's now a pricey paper weight.


I do apologize ahead of time to whoever built this but im being honest...

 

Hmmm. Very interesting point. Thank you very much for the help. Its too bad because i think its a really nice manifold. I wanted it really bad. But i dont want to waste my money on something thats gonna bring me headache. Any other opinions? And thanx again for the help

 

You think welding a bracket from the T3 flange to in between runner # 2 & 3 flange would help with the stress? Ive seen some top mount manis like that.

 

You could always buy the manifold and take it to a machine shop to machine the flange flat. Then it's fine.

 

Imo that's putting a bandage on something in properly built.

You could do that, but it being that warped shows there wasn't a lot of attention put into the manifold. How flat is the turbo flange? Is it even back purged? Who built it? Does it come with a lifetime warranty? Things id ask my self before buying it. I'm not bashing the person who built it nor the manifold it self. There's only 2 pictures of it and im just analyzing what i can see.

 

is the warping from taking the part off the jig before letting it cool down properly? It appears to have been used to me did the seller say it works flawlessly?

 

The seller claims that this is an AFI manifold. He said it was made over 2 years ago. I sent a message to AFI to confirm and i am waiting to see if it is authentic. And yes, he claims that it works perfectly.

 

Doesn't look back purged, also the turbo flange is warped. If AFI did infact build it id be surprised. I know the welders there are very good, with welds that dont look like that.

 

Agreed that it doesn't look back-purged and both flanges are definatly warped. They are also Mild-Steel flanges so they must not of had them bolted down to anything while welding to them as mild-steel isn't as easy to warp as Stainless.

That being said, the welds and joint alignment appear to be good. More then likely the manifold will hold up just fine, it just all depends on what you're paying for this. Could you spend just a little more and get a new one from a known and trusted company? If you are getting a killer deal on it i'd say it's just fine...after getting the flanges straight.