Step Up Your Performance

Tube technologies incorporated step headers add 15 hp

- Chris Holley

Headers. The mere word conjures up images of a serious operating mill with an equally ear-pleasing, authoritative rumble of performance. While that dreamy state seems satisfying, as John Conlee sang, “These rose-colored glasses that I’m looking through show only the beauty ’cause they hide all the truth.”

And the truth is that operating a vehicle equipped with headers often seems filled with hassles and additional maintenance. Many headers require denting and dinging of one or more of the tubes to fit into the engine bay properly. The header gaskets tend to blow out, which leads to pesky exhaust leaks. Ground clearance becomes a concern due to the low-hanging pipes that must clear the steering and suspension components as they snake around and out of the chassis. Many sparkplug wires have been sacrificed to the automotive gods in the name of performance when a wayward wire burns on a hot primary tube. Lastly, sparkplug removal can be a challenge with some headers because of the primary tube layout.