Header Help

I am helping (doing and teaching) a young friend with his 69 Torino GT. The body looks excellent but as soon as the hood was opened, YUCK! Anyway I talked him into pulling the 351W so I could paint the engine bay. $%&^#@* hot rodder couldn't leave well enough alone and he went out and bought Trickflow AL heads, Harland Sharps, Airgap intake, Thumpr cam, converter, etc.

Not a great header selection available for that body but we went with Hooker Supercomps. I can't believe they actually tested that header in this combination! I ended up cutting the shock towers1/2" for clearance on both sides, flattening a tube on each side by the shock towers, cutting and rewelding the trans shifter bracket, and the collectors still didn't line up with the cutouts in the trans crossmember so I cut clearance into the crossmember and rewelded that. One pipe STILL hit the trans case. BTW, heads have stock exhaust location. I think the problem is they try to make one header model fit a lot of body styles and everything is a compromise.

But here's a tip.:
With nothing to lose I grabbed a jack handle and jammed it through the collector and into one of the primary pipes. Put a pipe extension on the jack handle and the two of us pulled down and actually bent each header away from the trans and slightly down away from the crossmember to get clearance. It would be easier to get leverage if the car was on a lift but of course we're laying on cardboard on the garage floor. It has about 1/2" of clearance now and that'll have to do.
You might try it.