Spaceme1117

So I decided to install headers on my E-force powered 2011 Grand Sport. My car is the dry sump LS3 since it is a 6-speed manual. This also means that the E-force kit I installed included the aux oil cooler/warmer that bolts to the side of the oil pan near the oil filter and is cooled/warmed by engine coolant. I had searched here if anyone had tried to install headers on a manual trans, Grand Sport but did not find anything. Lots of people who put headers on auto GS's without any problem but no manuals (auto kits don't have the aux oil cooler). The potential problem for the manual cars is that the aux oil cooler could be in the way of certain headers.

I decided that to maximize my chances of headers fitting, I ordered a set of Kooks for a ZR1. My thinking was that the ZR1 has an aux oil cooler in the same area even though it is a little different from the E-force cooler and the ZR1 headers would be designed to clear the cooler. They do indeed fit and have plenty of clearance. In fact these Kooks have much better fit and clearance than American Racing headers I had on the car before the E-force. Also, installed a lot easier than the ARH's. I paired the ZR1 headers with a catted X-pipe and the factory NPP exhaust. Sounds great now.

Going to get a dyno/street tune in a few weeks to optimize everything.

Pictures:


Aux Oil Cooler on the drivers side just in front of the oil filter. Header clears by about 1/4 of an inch. May add some heat reflective tape in that area.

Passenger side header

Drivers side header.

Rear of X-pipe.

Bottom of car showing x-pipe.

m60gov20

Looks great! I'll be watching to see how much power you pick up.

Spaceme1117

Thanks. I will post dyno results once I have them.

xiarcher

Looking to do the same on 2012 GS, I assume you did this yourself. I have the quick jack5000 lift that gets the car up to 22in off ground. do you think this is good/? I'm also 63 yrs old and on the back is not so good. Howed the install go for wiggle room on the headers.

Spaceme1117

Yes, I installed everything myself. I probably had the car about 18 to 20 inches in the air on jack stands. So you shouldn’t have any problem with your quickjack. If you have a low profile creeper, that should help out.

The Kooks installed much easier than any other set of headers I have ever installed. They also have better clearances than a previous set of American Racing headers I had on the car previously.

Drivers side when in pretty easy. Only thing I had to do was unbolt the bellhousing bolt that secures the bracket for the clutch line.

Passenger side, I did unbolt the starter to heat insulate the wires but the header would have gone in with the starter in place.

m60gov20

Why did you switch from ARH's to Kooks?

Spaceme1117

I had removed the ARH's when I installed the E-force. The tune supplied with the E-force specified that it was only for a completely stock car and Edelbrock would not provide a tune for anything but stock.

I ran the stock exhaust until recently putting a set of ZR1 Kooks headers on. I went with the ZR1 Kooks headers in the hopes that they would clear the Edelbrock provided ZR1-style oil cooler and they do.

Since I put the Kooks on, I also decided to get a dyno tune. I went to Norris Motorsports near Indianapolis this morning and had my car dyno tuned by Mike Norris.

This weekend was probably the worst possible day I could have chosen as both the ambient temps and humidity were probably the highest they will be for the entire year; almost 90F and near 100% humidity at 9:30 AM. So my car was heat soaking pretty bad. IAT's were approaching 170F at the end of each dyno run.

But Mr. Norris made massive improvements to my car over the Edelbrock provided tune. Base line dyno numbers on the Edelbrock tune were pretty bad; 397 whp and 382 tq on a Dynojet. After 4 total runs, Mr. Mike improved the tune to give me final numbers of 460 whp and 482 tq.

And Mr. Mike was very thorough, took his time, was very knowledgeable, and friendly. He said the Edelbrock tune was very, very rich. Final AFR ended up being about 11.7 and nice and flat. Boost with the headers was 7.8 psi.

What I think is impressive is the torque curve. My car is making over 400 lb-ft of tq starting just above 2K rpm's. Mr. Mike said the car should have a good bit more power once we have some temperatures that are a bit more mild than found inside Satan's *******.