New Ram Exhaust

[Don Shillady]

Speedway Motors is advertising a new Ram-type SBC exhaust manifold. I have messed with a number of tubing headers that rusted and chromed units that rapidly blued so I kind of like the permanence of the cast iron manifolds. The new manifolds look like a higher arched form of the SBC rams horn manifolds, but so far I am not aware of any performance tests. The shorty block hugger 1 5/8" headers for SBC have been tested in many places and seem to be worth about 30 H.P and maybe 30 ft. lb. of torque so I am reluctant to just go to the new type without seeing some tests. Those circle track racers who have to use "stock" manifolds often pay a lot to get the interior of stock manifolds gouged out but even then they do not seem to offer the same performance advantage of the 1 5/8" tube headers. Has anyone seen any test of the new "high-arch ram" SBC manifolds. I would like to try them if they offer the same performance as the shorty tube type headers.

Don Shillady
Retired Scientist/teen rodder