Thought I'd use this to keep everyone updated. Leo is getting it tonight, not sure when he'll be done with it. I'll post again when he is.

When are you planing on putting it back in your car? Its getting Colder everyday. Unless you have a heated garage?

I bet he is planning on putting it in when it is all done!!!

Brad, are you gonna end up putting on headers and a Y pipe? How about a test pipe? Just wondering what other performance mods you may be thinking of doing while the engine is out.

If it gets too cold I'll just wait till next spring. I'm not sure how long the weather will last, and how long Leo will take. If that's the case I'll slowly upgrade everything on the engine while I wait.

Yes I plan on getting MSDS headers/y-pipe and a high-flow cat. Don't know if I can afford it yet, but I plan on doing it :)

I would recomend the headers for sure, if you are going to get an aftermarket y-pipe, go with the true bendz set up. Then you will be totallt cat less and the results coupled with your supercharger will be amazing.
If you can't afford all of that just gut your manifolds and get the truebendz y pipe. I think that would be the all around best bang for your buck. If Leo is really busy and if you want, I will do some of your engie work for you. I can do some porting work for you but a machine shop will have to do the valve job( Machine work will run you about $150 I think) But I will do the porting for the cost of materials( about $20-$30 for the grinding bits).

Also if it gets cold out that heater will warm your garage pretty well and I have one too that I can bring out to take the chill out of the air.

Male or female?

Oh I just knew someone had to go there. Could be worse though atleast you drive a bowtie and not one of those riced out Neon's <<< and now I finally get to use this emotiocon

http://www.teamneco.com/phpBB2/viewtopic.php?t=7485 Found this deal on the TN site. all you need after that is the tru bendz y-pipe..http://www.contour.org/classifieds/classifieds.php?t=1&c=6 found this on CEG, even better than the true bendz from what I hear about 1/3 of the way down the page only $100

For the price of Weapon R headers you can have MSDS headers and a SHO Shop Y pipe!

Jason you rock, I got almost 5 used ones to check on from your two links. I didn't even know Weapon R made headers. My problem is the jackshaft for my supercharger. I need the special MSDS headers that have a bend to accomodate them. I'm trying to buy from those two guys you found and see if I can swap mine with Marty. If Weapon R makes some that have the bend I'll have to get them instead. I figure even the cheapest ones will be better than my current stock ones. Do you know what the cheapest header set for the Cougar is?

the weapon r headers are bad knockoffs of the msds headers. Just spend the $$ on the msds, its well worth it. Plus with the weapon r's you have to modify the egr tube to fit up with the motor. msds bolt right up no probs

Um... what he said. But if you are looking to go cheap, I can do the modifications to get you around the jackshaft, and with the engine out of the car the EGR tube routing will be a snap.

And the weapon-R are certainly the cheapest avail, but yes the MSDS are superior in quality... from what I understand. I have yet to actually see the weapon-R's up close to compair.

If I had time I would just build you some custom headers, but that is a lot of fabrication and I would need a spare engine on a stand to mock it all up.

Well I dropped the tranny off and Leo said it will be more than two weeks which puts me into mid November. Most likely spring before it goes back in. Jason I'll load up all your tools and the cherry picker and head to your house when you're available. If by some strange miracle it's above 60 when I get it back I might try it, but since we don't live in Florida I'm 90% for putting it in next year.

Thanks for all the help everyone!

Custom JRAK Headers, exclusive to MC-Neco members...that'd be kind of cool. Everybody has MSDS or Weapon-R. You could be, like, the next GMK, Jason. Heh.

lol, I have been thinking about it for some time now, I should just get off my ass and do it. Bad part... I am too honest, I don't think I would be able to make a profit on them.

There's nothing "dishonest" about making a reasonable profit for your labor.

yeah but I look st it from a perspective that everyone like me works hard for thier money, I would want to give the best deal I could to make it affordable.

Well I have gotten my wheels turning and I am working on getting a mock up engine and heads so I can fab up some custom MC-NECO headers.

Brad when time comes if you don't have youe engine back together I would like to get with you about borrowing your Vortec and jack shaft to make them SC friendly.

You got it man, I can drop the jackshaft and mounting bracket off with your tools sometime this week if you like. I'll sign up as your first customer too, since I have all winter to get my header situation figured out.

There ya go, I will let you know what I have going on so we can set something up. I am hoping to hear back from the people I have pm'ed about their junk engines. If worst come to worst I can ask nandalora if I can borrow his ols 2.5 with the spun bearing. BUt I am kinda hoping on getting my own and then building it with the profits from the header build.

the headers idea sounds great, what would a jet-coat cost and all though?

That I have not yet looked into, but there is a chopper shop local to me that sends their stuff out to powder coat and the owner told me he would check into the pricing for me.

I got ahold of a block and a set of heads I just have to go pick them up in Columbus. I may do this next week on Monday, then I will have to get some mild steel to mock up the flanges and order some mild steel tube stock and u-bends( the mild steel is only for mock up it's a lot easier to work with and cheaper if I make mistakes at the start) If all goes well I will have my first set finished around Christmas.

I will be making my first "real" set for Brad and then wel will see how it goes from there. I am hoping to make a Y-pipe similar to True bendz as well.

I can get powdercoating and jethot done locally here man, if you want. Same shop that does all my goodies... =)

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Kick ass, Well I should be picking up my mock up engine Monday and hope to start fabricating that weekend. With my current tiime constraints it will probably take me a little more tha a month to get my fist useable set ready for coating. I will be making my first real set for Brad. So keep that in mine E1 for your FI engine!

you could potentially make a killing....mainly because you could do the O2 bungs per order etc. then us early ATX guys aren't screwed all the time lol

Jason i want some... let me know if that engine falls through you could probably have my SVT engine all i want is the cams and valve covers that i don't have off it already...

My thouhgts exactly!

You aredn't going to use the block and heads? Hmmmm we need to talk scot.

I'm assuming this means you have already stripped off the UIM/TB/LIM, not that you aren't using them at all, correct? MY engine, darn it. ;)

upper lower and TB are off just need to get a cable and bracket and they will be on my car ASAP cams are going to come out and be sold and if jason doens't need the rest it will all be sold too.. might clean up teh black valve covers and see if i can put them onwihtout dropping thor pulling the engine jsut to black my engine bay out a ilittle more...

You can do the valve covers when you do the UIM, I would save the SVT cams though Scot, unless you are gonna go ahead with the 3.0l eventually. You will have to give me a list of whats left of the engine and whatnot and a price I will take the stuff off your hands.

I already have the MSDS S/C Headers, bought them over a year ago... =(

But, I'd still like to see another option out there for other ppl. Brad and I discussed this not too long ago.

I'm currently making multiple parts, here's what's on my plate right now:

Solid Motor Mounts (Prototypes done, sending to GMK for testing)
Roll Resistors
Tranny Mount
Rear Sway-Bar (First prototype done, based on BAT bar, but hollow, didn't fit perfect so we're redoing it)

Oh, and Brad got to see yesterday what its like w/ a big rear swaybar when entering a steep driveway at an angle. (BANG) Or as Brad put it, "Damn, yer rear end sounds like its about to fall apart" LOL... I found out its my exhaust moving too much, time to weld in some reinforcements...

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