I get it, $! BUt I am receiving my lovely Kooks and the system seems so heavy. But you know raw Ti tubing doesn't cost much it's just tough to work with.

I'm surprised no one makes a Ti system for an extra $1K or something.

If I had a new Vette, it's something that I would easily spend the money for personally.

Has this ever existed in the V8 car world?

 

You already answered your question......too expensive and too difficult to work.

Plus.....the headers/hi-flo cats don't really weigh much (if any) more than the parts they'll replace.

I mean....the OEM exhaust manifolds and cat converters are some heavy ****'s....

KW

 

I bet Nick at American Racing Headers can answer your question! I bet ya he can give you an exact price for a Ti header set.

Call ARH and speak with Nick.

Maybe he can produce a set. Cant even begin to guess on a price. They already have the JIGs for regular ARH headers. Don't know what the difference would be other than special care in the welding process and the extra cost of the Ti tubing and materials. See what he says.

Bill

 

https://www.corvetteforum.com/forums...rs-anyone.html

 

well lets start with you can't weld Ti, forming it would be a problem . you would probably have to invent the tech to do it 7 figure set of headers anyone?

 

Why CANT you weld Ti????????????? That is an INCORRECT STATEMENT.
You can weld it. You MUST shield the weld area 100% in Argon. The shield gas has to be flooded inside the piping and on the outside welded area where you are working. It really isnt that difficult but, the proces has to be 100% correct.

Take a lesson from an expert:

 

https://youtu.be/k5lWvYumstk

You can most certainly weld titanium. And if you look at the link I previously shared in my other post, he was selling titanium headers for around $2k.

 

Living in Austin, go see Jessie James at Austin Speed, my bet he will make you a set.

I did 18 autograph events with his wife last year, she is a really fine person. can't tell you anything about him, we never interacted, but she is really nice.

 

Titanium bicycle frames surely are welded!

 

I don't think ti is good idea for headers as the sustain torch like fire coming off the head will likely distort the pipes making them shift and possibly distort, i know motorcycles guys have used them but imo that is a much less powerful torch effect then that of a wild v8 can hand out.

I have tried using aluminum after headers connection and it distorts and have to be dealt with so to keep it from bending away and out of line do know ti is very different and way stronger but there's got to be a good reason for Akrapovic to want to do thick cast instead of tubing and shorties instead of long tubes when approached for this same purpose.

 

Cast Iron has a melting point of 2300F
Stainless Steel has a melting point of 2550F
Titanium has a melting point of 3263F

That means that Titanium headers can withstand approximately 700F more heat than traditional Stainless Steel headers can. Or close to 1000F more than the factory cast iron manifolds.

Source - http://ganoksin.com/blog/cgmfindings...elting-metals/

 

That is a bunch of heat!

 

At the end of the day you would need to get enough people willing to spend the money on them. You can't sell just a few sets and make it worth your investment.

I would imagine saving another 10lbs isn't worth an extra grand to most owners. Maybe I am wrong, who knows.

 

Typical wrong answers from you know who.

 

So I bought a new set of Kooks SS headers that aren't even installed yet so that's the direction I'm going.

But Ti holds up very well and it's like a feather when you pick it up compared to SS. It weighs a LOT less because it's stronger so they use less of it. If you have ever picked up a Ti exhaust system for an I4 sport bike compared to the SS version the difference is really dramatic. The Ti version looks like a big chunk of steel but you can pick it up with your pinky. It can ding pretty easily when it gets glowing red hot but that would never happen in a car. BTW, a 4 stroke dirt bike is tuned to within an inch of it's life and is ran much harder than even a tracked Vette. I promise you the dirt bikes all running around with Ti exhaust systems (some from the factory) put a LOT more heat in to them than cars ever will. You are talking well over 200hp/ liter out of those race 250F engines.

It's hard to compare prices using Akropovic. I'm very familiar with their stuff from my years with motorcycles but their stuff is absurdly overpriced. Let me give you an example. I bought a new KTM Motard (single cylinder dual sport) motorcycle in 2008 and the dealer had a Ti Akro exhaust systems for it. That bike cost like $7.5k new. What did Akro want for their single cylinder pipe for the bike? $2.8K!!! I bought a full Ti FMF for $428 instead! My point being that Akro is not going to build a cost effective solution. I mean their mufflers for Vettes cost like $4K right? GM use to sell the C5Z with factory Ti mufflers so it can be done at a reasonable cost.

A large company like Kooks could build a full Ti header system for (guessing here) maybe $1K more and that could easily represent a 90# weight savings. The material (remember, by weight you use less of it) would cost a similar amount, it's the production that cost more.

Would I buy a $3K Ti header system for my 8 year old C6? No. But would I buy one for my new $70-100K C7? Absolutely!

And BTW, they do sell them for Porsches and what not so it's been done. Mass production for Corvettes should easily contain the costs.

 

Stainless is $8/ft and Titanium is $3/in, so quite a big cost difference. There'd be other upfront costs that would be prohibitive as well. Our tech said, "It'd be cheaper to join Jenny Craig and lose 10 lbs that way!"

 

I was thinking of finding away to weight out of my car and came the same conclusion, start with the driver.......

 

So assuming the average tube length per port is about 24 inches, that would be 192 inches or 16 feet of tube.

Material cost would be about $128 for stainless or $576 for Titanium. So Titanium would cost about $448 more in materials. Just a rough ballpark.

 

Doesn't sound that bad to me material costs wise.

 

If I joined Jenny, I'd lose everything in the divorce. Oh wait, you meant the diet program?

Actually, the biggest problem is forming Ti. That's why the tubing is so pricey. You just can't slip flat stock on a tube mill and hit the button. Once you have the tubing, you still need to form the bends.
I bent a lot of flat stock for F16's and F18's valve bodies in the late 80's. It's highly susceptible to cracking when cold formed, especially when forming parallel to the grain. The usual technique was sandwiching with 316L SS. Since the main body was essentially a sophisticated tube with flanges, it was machined from round bar stock. The welding was the easy part. After all contamination was removed, the several additional parts were welded in a large argon purged bubble.