340 Exhaust Manifolds on Early A-Body??

Now I'm really interested...... It looks like the mini starter would help out a bit and I wonder if the column outer shell is a little shorter (closer to the firewall) on a manual or floor shifter column? If not it wouldn't be that hard at all to remove a half inch or so out of the column near the end to move the seal up away from the heat. If they flow fairly well I would love to pull out these damn tti's.