Header Ceramic Coating? Worth it?

[vacca rabite]

Ceramic coating is like magic for pushing heat out the tail pipe and not letting it out through the header walls.

I had ceramic coated headers for a while, and got used to how quick they cooled.

I put on SS headers and burned myself silly one day getting under the car to do some work the first time. 

The difference in heat was night and day.

Zach

 

[arminyack]

I've been looking into this one:

 

http://swaintech.com/race-coatings/race-coating-descriptions/white-lightning-exhaust-coatings/

[Ian]

3 hours ago, arminyack said:

I've been looking into this one:

 

http://swaintech.com/race-coatings/race-coating-descriptions/white-lightning-exhaust-coatings/

Swain has a great reputation for effective coatings.  They are just down the road from me, and I plan to bring my headers to them for coating.

 

[TobyB]

Quote

 longevity and no maintenance

 

The 6% was for the red color.  Everything else, not so much.  Except that 

it DOES tend to hold up pretty well.  

 

That said, the can of VHT 2000f cost me 

$6.95, I've used up less than half of it, and after the second or third coating, the

headers on the race car don't seem to shed it very much, and stay nice and silvery.

 

As to heat and velocity, the idea is that hot air takes up more volume,

so for example, keeping a turbo manifold hot maximizes the volume of 

gasses to spin the turbine.  In a normally- aspirated application, the only

gains you'd ever see would be at specific rev ranges, and then probably only

in pretty controlled circumstances.  And usually, when you get to flat- out, you

pretty much want a drainpipe, anyways.  Relative to everything else, that is.

Yes, it's science.  But it's one element of an almost infinite system...

 

t

 

[vacca rabite]

I would caution about header wrap.

It does a great job at keeping heat in the pipes and out the tail.  But it also absorbs oil and can become a fire hazard.  Its fine to use, but you should only place it in locations unlikely to be dripped on on a regular basis.

 

Zach

Edited December 14, 2016 by vacca rabite

[halboyles]

20 minutes ago, vacca rabite said:

I would caution about header wrap.

It does a great job at keeping heat in the pipes and out the tail.  But it also absorbs oil and can become a fire hazard.  Its fine to use, but you should only place it in locations unlikely to be dripped on on a regular basis.

 

Zach

Second this.  I've had this happen on a relatively new header the PO had wrapped.  Oil leaks from the head get absorbed into the wrapping cloth.  In addition it really stinks!

[AceAndrew]

15 hours ago, Ian said:

Swain has a great reputation for effective coatings.  They are just down the road from me, and I plan to bring my headers to them for coating.

 

 

Swain coating is great and the most effective in terms of thermal control.  The caveat is that on a street car or a car that sees regular use, the white finish does not last long and cannot be cleaned effectively.  Still, visions of the '67 Ferrari 312 dance in my head.

 

The silver lining is you can actually do a "shiny" coat of ceramic on top of the swaintech coating.