Exhaust Manifold Replacement Suggestions

I've had a noisy leak coming from my exhaust manifold for quite some time now. I've been patching it up with some heat-resistant paste but that seems to be working less now and I am getting quite tired of the noise. I've decided to bite the bullet and take the job on myself, as the shop said they would charge ~1500 to do it.

Does anyone have suggestions for a more budget-friendly manifold replacement? Not looking to do a cat delete, just wanting to fix this exhaust leak! Also, I did research TW for a bigger thread on this, please point me to one if I missed something.

 

Buy a catted manifold from LCE and do the labor yourself or find someone to R&R it for a cheaper labor quote. Labor to do 1 side/manifold shouldnt be more than $200-300 but thats relative to your vicinity, etc....

https://www.lceperformance.com/OEM-2009-2015-TOYOTA-Tacoma-with-4-0L-V6-1GR-Exhau-p/1041076.htm

 

I’m not sure if there’s studs and nuts or bolts. If they’re not stainless, which I doubt they are, expect difficulties. I’d suggest repeatedly spraying the fasteners with a good penetrant. Pb blaster or something similar, wd40 isn’t all that great. Also think to yourself every fastener will snap off in the head. That way if only one or two do break, you won’t be disappointed. Also think if your drill will fit to get the broken piece out or will you need to buy a 90 degree drill. You have good extractors and plenty of experience using them? There’s the pessimistic point of view.

If you use some liquid wrench, run the engine to heat it up, repeat over and over. Then be gentle with removal. One trick, put your socket & ratchet on it, pull to loosen, then slightly to tighten, do that a few times, clean, then pull to loosen & tie the ratchet pulled with tension on it, walk away. Come back later and it might have loosened a little. Back and forth action with it wet with penetrant will work it in and help get it out.

 

$700 for one side alone
holy fuck
I doubt it costs that much to produce. They're just having fun marking up the price tearing people new assholes.

I'd sooner buy a good condition used junkyard unit before that. And then clean it prior to painting the inside and outside for rust prevention.
Hopefully there are other products on the market available new.

I know on some vehicles at least, they prefer the cat to be up high a certain extent, to warm up enough (and quickly) to operating temperature. Where it functions to reduce emissions.

I've seen a botched repair job on a car that had nice headers and to "revert to stock" to sell the car, the shop could have removed them to sell and install some stock parts.
But they had Helen Keller hack apart the headers to weld in cats. To avoid the labor of removing the headers (would require skill) and gain high up access where it's buried deep, they just welded where it's exposed. Under the vehicle.
As in way far down stream by the bellypan.
End result was the car still had a check engine light. Did not warm up the cats like it needed.
Time and money spend to butcher nice headers that resulted in a vehicle that still could not pass emissions and be sold.

I don't know if every car cares or how it works. Some V6 cars for example have one cat (per exhaust bank) far downstream.
While some cars have two (per bank, V6) as a smaller pre-cat up high and larger main cat downstream.

 

Is the manifold cracked? If just leaking from where it bolts to the head maybe you just need a new gasket? If it’s been leaking from there for a really long time you might have some deformed mating surface that a new gasket won’t seal.