I usually have pretty decent luck in life. I could see blaming fitment on an engine sitting out of position, but the RH pipes are grouped together too wide. The oil pan and Torsion bar are parallel yet the pipes are too wide to fit between them without denting. I'm probably going to pull the RH out to smash in some clearance. I hate doing it but I dont want them to rattle or cook the temper out of the torsion bar. I suppose they would heat the oil in the pan too.

We did some tech for Hedman on these particular headers years ago at their request as we were Mopar specific. The headers were tested on 67-72 and 73 newer a-body applications. Without modifications we considered them as a no-fit header at least for the applications we tested. Suggestions were made to Hedman for possible improvements
but it appears no changes were made. Even if the headers were modified above for clearance then it takes a pretty good pipe bender tech to hook them up to clear linkage and everything else. Cutting the 3 bolt flanges off offers a little more room but it still is difficult for an experienced fabricator.

Schumacher Creative Industries sells a wonderful smallblock header- but they are very expensive.

I once made the mistake of trying to fit a set of Doug Thorley headers into by 74 FrankenDuster. After somewhere between 12-15 times installing, removing to make clearance dents and trial fitting again, I got fed up and hacked them apart with a sawzall. I ordered TTI pipes and never regretted it. I had every intention of keeping that car but ended up selling it a few years later.
This time I'm working on a car that I plan to sell. I knew these were cheap headers and expected to have a few adjustments to make. If this were a low budget bracket race car, the money saved on headers would be fine. In truth, even with some additional dents they will still outflow even the best factory iron manifold. If & when I decide to build another A body to keep, I will sell parts, mow lawns, wash cars or have a bake sale to have the $$$ to buy a set of Dougs or TTI pipes.

Are these problems with Hedman only found in small block applications? Will be searching for RB headers in my B body soon. I've heard dougs are nice

The main problem stems from trying to fit CHEAP headers in an A body Chassis.
When I went from a 318 to a 440 in my Charger, my first set of headers were Hooker #5903. The car had never been in a wreck and I used new mounts. The headers still made contact at the LH torsion bar and the idler arm. I later went with Hooker #5209 pipes. Those had a 3&1 design with a separate pipe from the 4. Yeah, still a few points of contact. These TTIs clear everything, even the Fast ratio Idler and Pitman even though their instructions clearly state that they DO NOT clear.
I like the habit of UNDER promising and OVER delivering.

I hear you. Do you remember the part # on the TTI?

I guess you get what you pay for . My Hustlers were not cheap by any means, but they fit like a glove and make good power.

Back when I wanted to get my GTX back on the road I cut out the beat Hookers and tossed in a cheap set of the Summit house brand.

440 in a b-body but I was impressed, they hit nothing and fit perfect.

Go figure.

As an A-body owner they have always been a bear when it came to headers.

Free junk is still junk. I'm a manifold guy (but would pass on the expensive extrude honing because it actually does very little) but if I was going to use headers I would buck up and buy a decent set. Smashing headers in a bunch of locations and still having the pipes way to close to the oil pan and other elements isn't my idea of a great install.



Dave

you might look at some smallblock truck shorty headers. they're tight to the block, and exit at the rear.

I had a set of Dakota 5.2/5.9 headers once. The RH side looked like it would fit but the LH collector aimed right at the trans column linkage. I even looked at a manual trans car I had and the clutch linkage torque shaft was in the way there as well. The LH collector seems to need to be between #s 5 and 7 port and pointing almost straight down.

Thanks for the advice. I had read elsewhere once about this but never really looked into it.
Just had a look at Dakota headers and they seem affordable enough to find on Ebay to try out a set.
My Dart has a console-shifter but the headers could get some modifying if needed. It also has powerbrakes and powersteering (But it's a Borgeson box).

On the other hand I've never seen any good pics of smallblock A-bodies with these kinda Dakota headers on them before.

The thing "I don't get" about the Hedman design. I'm an old guy. Those were first made, when? late 60's? certainly early 70's. I HAD a set when I swapped a SB into a 70 B body in about 74?

The point? NO reason why a product that has spanned that length of time could not have been "tweeked" to fit acceptably.

I DO understand the variation in A body pillow mounts, but the OP seems to have spool mounts which should get that part of the tolerance down to a fairly small amount.