Hello, My 77 454 has had a small exhaust at the headers since I bought it but it was never bad enough to mess with. I was hoping to have money left over out of my $1000 a year budget to by Thornleys one of these years. Well it never happened, this year I am way over budget with new tires and generator and the headers finally broke. I ordered a cheap set like it had on it and let my 16 year old son have at it. Later in the day I went out to check on him and to my surprise he was almost done. I looked at the header pieces laying on the ground and they looked similar to the new ones with nice big round pipes at the flange. Then I looked over at the gaskets and they had square holes. At first I happy because I thought the original problem was someone had used the wrong gasket. I started discussing this with my son when he told me the exhaust ports were the same gaskets, square. Well he was almost done so we just finished it to see what would happen. We started it and drove it 20 miles with no leaks at all. My question is does this 454 come with two types of exhaust ports or are they all square? Other than the fact I have cheap headers do you think the round pipes are designed to work on these heads with the correct gasket? All the info that came with them and on the website tells me these are correct for this model.

Thanks, Neil

The head ports are square with rounded corners. With good gaskets you could probably use either round or square pipes. See ports and Thorley headers here:

https://www.barthmobile.com/eve...1087061/m/1733908187

good luck

Thats what I thought but wanted to make sure. It looks like the wrong header gaskets was the original problem after all. Sure is a lot quieter with everything sealed up in there. I was always paranoid of breaking off a bolt plus I hate doing exhaust work. Turned out to be a good plan, I waited long enough for my son to grow up and did it for me.

quote:

Originally posted by Neil T.:
I waited long enough for my son to grow up and did it for me.

Lucky you. My sons don't even change their own oil or wiper blades.

I don't know where I failed.

Funny, I have been guiding my son to do anything else than what I do but he insists he wants to work on cars. He is a lot better with computers and electronics so it should work out for him. He was seriously thinking of going to the military but I think he has changed his mind about that.

Now that I am older I realize why men have sons. In spite of the the trouble, it would be nice to have an assistant.

Ahh, the memories of Dad drilling through my shoe, tearing down old houses for lumber, dodging chains and sawdust, sanding boat bottoms...

Then again, there's the Mother's curse: "I hope when you grow up you have a son just like you!" Yep, he'd lose my tools, wreck my car, mess up my fishing poles...

I'll just have to plod along myself.

quote:

it would be nice to have an assistant.

I am not the natural mechanic you are. But, when you really need another pair of hands, I can drive up there and do as I'm told.

Hi everyone. I have a question about replacing headers on my 1987 Barth Regal 33. Can you just unbolt them and pull them out the bottom and will there be enough clearance or does the RV need to be jacked up?

Thanks for any advice
jumanjii1

If you have the tag axle the coach has plenty of room underneath to remove them. I replaced the one on the right from above!

(Actually I just reinstalled the right one on the new engine today, same way.)

Here are pictures from mine last winter.

https://www.barthmobile.com/eve...733908187#1733908187

good luck

I dropped mine down the bottom and connected them to the exhaust pipes with band clamps. I did a small rosette weld on each side of each pipe to prevent any moving.