Repairing crushed header tube

Last month I went to Mississippi for " Cruisin the Coast" and brought my 70 hemi powered 'Cuda for driving the route. We got a hotel in Gulfport and had a pretty good time. The only problem we had was returning to our hotel the first night after dark and I did not notice that they use low,approx 6" high flat top concrete curb type dividers between opposing lanes on the main drag and I went to make a left into the parking lot and drug a header tube on each side bad enough that they were cupped and crushed halfway shut for about 7" long on the drivers side and about 6" long on the passenger side. These are 2-1/8 coated TTI headers and I was not a happy camper. The damage on both were where the tubes were horizontal and about a foot from the collector flange. Trying to figure out how to repair it, I came up with the idea cutting the ball off of an old 1-7/8" trailer ball and welding it onto a 24" piece of 5/8" solid round stock. We clamped the headers across the arms of my buddies fork lift, greased up the ball with axle grease inserted it into the tube and with the help of a 3 lb hammer started applying a bit of force. After working out 2" of dent, we would pull out and regrease the ball repeating until we got past the end of the crush. We were able to restore the tube to over 98% of its original inside diameter. Between the chrome plating on the ball and liberal amounts of grease, it never got stuck tight enough to require more than a bit of wiggling to remove it. Now I need to cover the damaged area as the coating was completely scraped off of the damaged area, I am thinking of trying some of the hi-heat ceramic paint that they have for brake calipers at the parts house. I just thought I would post this as it was an easy, low buck repair idea for anyone in the same position.

Adding heat to the pipes helps.

People who do musical instrument repair work use balls of varying sizes and push them thru the dented area starting with small ones and working their way up to the final desired size. What you did is similar and glad you were able to make it work.

You just remandreled the pipes.

Helped a friend on his many years ago. Used what looked like a steel race driver that was an almost perfect fit in an undamaged tube. Put it on the end of a 3' section of threaded rod, heated the tube, and tapped it in. Worked like a charm.



Tim

Mr thinks the OP was asking about covering the damaged surface, good high temp paint will work untill you recoat them. I recoated my headers after setting the engine back and rerouting 3 tubes.

We had a torch on hot stand by, and even though the TTI's have fairly thick tubing, it was pretty easy without heat. The advantage to the ball is smaller contact area which irons it out with minimal drag. I found some VHT ceramic header paint and primer at the local Advance and the silver was a pretty good match. In the middle of freshening up the Hemi but should have it finished before the New Year.

Very considerate of you to post about the repair. This stuff helps others.
Nice job, sir!

I appreciate it too.