WARNING on eBay Headers!!

[Rated M]

Hey Guys... I'll save you guys the headache and $$....


I bought a set of ceramic coated ebay headers quite awhile back, I bought this particular set because it had the thinner flanges on it so you wouldn't have to replace the studs. I received the set and it looked ok, it had the typical flange out of alignment deal of which is an easy fix with some heat.


Well, I was taking my entire exhaust apart over this weekend to prep for my OEM Euro Headers I picked up. Being that I had a far superior set of headers, I naturally thought I would sell my eBay headers to someone on the forums here. So I took them out of the box and wanted to just try a quick test fit first to see how they would mount up..

Well, THEY DO NOT LINE UP at all.. The flanges are all out of whack, there is no way possible to modify these to fit without cutting and rewelding...


I'll let the pictures do the talking here:


This picture shows how the eBay headers bolt pattern looks:



Now, This picture is the OEM Header held up to the same bolt pattern:



Note how only the center flange aligns with the bolt pattern of the eBay headers.





Like I said, this is buyer beware, I picked these up quite awhile ago, so I don't know if this issue has been corrected or not. But just wanted to let you guys know if you were planning on cheaping out on some eBay headers.

[mpower03]

yes it is an issue, but i think this post is way over dramatized. each exhaust port has its on flange, the pipes will move a little bit. im sure that those will fit. Just as a side note, i would make sure you buy from a popular ebay vendor on these so you know what you are getting. Go on the m3forums and look for recent threads and see who people are using.

[O-cha]

Warned you.

[Rated M]

Originally Posted by O-cha

Warned you.

Haha, your words were one of the main reasons I held off last year from installing them... Now I am glad I did...

OEM FTW...