HOOKER 6208 SWAP FOR THE 351W This is a "how-to" on the Hooker 6208 swap for the 351w in a 1969.5-77 Ford Maverick and 71-77 Mercury Comet. 6208 is a part number for a set of Hooker Headers made for use on the 64-70 Mustang and Cougar. As some may know the 351w swap is a real pain , at first you may think , oh only 1/2 deck hight difference , but trust me 1/2 makes a HUGE difference, well at least in these cars it is. If you hate changing spark plugs or your hands are closterfobic , find your self a strong 302 based motor. However if you like the challenge and you can do some kind of cutting , welding, grinding, etc , then you should'nt have to much trouble. With this swap you better have some paticence, if you dont it will make it 10 times as hard. By NO means am i saying this will work , this is what i had to do to my 75 Maverick to MAKE them fit. KEYWORD: MAKE , cause you will have to make them fit. Something that will help you out on this swap is to have a spare block and heads you will be using also a bellhousing it will make your job so much easier. Another must have is shaved shock towers , spark plugs will be impossiable with out doing this. I DO have pictures however for some reason i cant show them on here, to large and i can shink them not sure whats going on, however you can email me and i WILL sent you pictures. 1. Ok first thing your going want to raise up the engine and mount the headers , to see where your going to have a problem, look at EVERYTHING , if you have to take measurements , do what ever you need to , i took a grease pencil and marked where the inferance problems will be. After you gotton some measurements/ ideas , of what its going to take to MAKE these fit, then pull engine and tranny unless you think you can raise the engine enough to work on it , i think having it all the way out makes it much easier. After you have it all out go to step 2. 2. This step can be done couple different ways. You can take a torch and heat up the frame and take a ball peen hammer , and make a pocket.Or take a plasma cutter and cut the frame out and reweld the frame . Either way is done so the # 4 tube can exit. I went with the torch and a ball peen hammer, heat up the frame till its cherry red, and take the ball peen hammer and make a pocket , its not alot just about an inch, maybe little less than that. The pocket needs to be made towards the front of the idler arm , about an inch in front of it. Dont be afaid to swing a hammer it will take a couple smacks. The bigger the hammer the better, bigger=less work! 3a. Now we move to the firewall , and once again this can be done couple different ways, you could cut your firewall out and make a sheet metal firewall , or the way i did it was take the same "BFH" we used on the frame, and make a way out for the #3 and #8 tube , as some might know Mustang engine bays have more room length way. This is why the firewall mods need to be done. Ok for the passenger side this is where MOST of the mod has to be done, as i stated above a big hammer will have to be used . On my car its right below the heater core inlet/outlets all the way down to the floor board. Its alot of hammering dont be afaid on this part either its ALOT hammering. 3b. driver side, its really not a whole lot of hammering , buts its still more than enough , i wish i would not have to do any hammering. Its hard to explain exactly where to hammer the firewall. But its about 4 inchs to the passenger side from the speedo cable, give or take a hair or two. It needs to be notched about 3-4 inchs again give or take an a hair or two agian. 4. Alright for the scary part. The steering box needs to be grinded back a bit. On the engine side of the gear box there is some extra casting that needs to be grinded away , it hits on the #6 tube. The way i understand is that this is just some extra casting . I grinded mine ALMOST smooth with the rest of gear box, i couldnt grind no more , i had to put couple litte dings in the header, nothing huge but sure beats seeing oil come out of your gear box. 5. Automatic is must , any kinda of manuel trans will not work unless you use cable clucth then it MIGHT work. You have to have floor shifter, doesnt have to be factory floor shifter but floor shifter none the less. If your car is orignialy a column shift you will have to remove the bracket on the column right before the gear box , it WILL have to be removed completely! Trust me on this one. The #7 tube will hit the bracket. And on a side note , im not sure if you can use your kickdown either, i doubt it, the way it looks to me. Ok i believe i have covered everything on this swap , if you have any questions or you want some pictures EMAIL ME maverickman05@msn.com
i used a set of 6901's in my comet and would not recomend it. i did get it to work with a manual tranny though. but i beat the living crap out of the headers instead of the car. then i had to have them cut and rerouted.
yeah 6901s really dont work , 6208s were a terriable PITA , but the more info you have , the easier it will be for the next person, being the 2nd person to do it , it was prolly alot more easier than being the first person, but now i hear crites headers works w/ one simple cut or something i dont know the details...
Im gonna steer clear of either of those if i go to a 351w.... as thats way to much dang work for headers.
How about no? lol If I do it I'll just my current headers and cut the shock towers... Ive seen it done before... lots easier than beating this **** out of your car for a set of headers
I'd rather do this conversion honestly than beat up my car w/ a a BFH just for headers. Your article was very helpeful. I wasnt criticizing you for doing it. Just was my opinion on how I'd do things. 1 3/4 would be nice however tho...
i know you werent criticizing im just saying it would be worth goin with mustang 2 if you want big tubes, its truly a PITA , but i wanted to be different...even though my headers fit , i just dont ever want to take them off
as a idea.. next time.. you can slice the top half of the shock tower off and weld flat plate in to about 3/4 of a inch to the springs for clearance.. from that point on the frame clearance will be easy http://www.freewebz.com/grabber351/cut.htm
I see where the article mentions that Blackjack header company no longer exists. Actually they were bought by Dynomax. I have heard, but can't prove, that Dynomax still uses the old Blackjack pattern for Maverick headers. I have the same Blackjack Alumicoats on my Mav as mentioned in the article.
the dynomax blackjacks dont fit trust me thats one of my sets of headers i tried before these... they were just all over the place , didnt fit AT ALL ....i hammered and HAMMERED and got no where i had to throw them away cause they were so beat up note: the shock tower notch DOESNT affect header fitment...just spark plug clearence and header bolt clearence...
I know this is an older post but I had to chime in, I did quite a bit of research into the swap and ran across many frustrated people trying to the same thing. I was determined to put a 351w in mine and didn't want to do ANY body modifications. I picked up a set of Hedman 88660, 1 5/8" to 3" collectors, they are made for an early Mustang 351w swap. I removed the power steering and went to manual, I had to "massage" the headers in a few spots but not enough to really restrict flow very much, next I cut and welded in a very small elbow to allow for pitman arm clearance. The biggest problem was the header bolts, so I cut and bent an old wrench. It is very tight and I need to remove the valve cover gaskets to remove the 2,3, 6 and 7 plugs, I re-use the Summit rubber/metal insert gaskets. Granted it takes 3 guys to put the engine in, one on each side to hold the headers in place while the third lowers the engine, but it is very possible with a minimal amount of work. Next time I pull the engine I'll use these headers as a template and make a set of step headers, 1 5/8" to 1 3/4" to 3" collectors. Hope this helps, thank you -ROB
