kman521
Well-Known Member
Let me start by saying I know there are a lot of people that swear by Schumacher headers and according to Michael in his 15 years in business he has only had 3 maybe 4 complaints and two of them were mine.
I will say that their headers fit really nice and there customer service is excellent.
About two years ago I purchased a set of Schumacher headers for my Dart 440 swap to replace the painted B-Body headers that were on it when I bought the car. There were no issues with the paint peeling on these B-Headers but they had dings all over for clearance.
I wrapped the new Schumacher headers in cardboard and tape so they wouldnt get scratched during the install.
After getting the car running for less than 30 minutes the car was stored away in an unheated dry garage for the winter season.
When I pulled the car out the following spring I noticed the headers were showing what looked like rust pit marks showing through the coating so I took pictures and sent them to Michael to get his opinion.
Michael said he would pay for shipping back to him and back to me and he would coat them again and return them and that is what happened. He told me at that time he had only seen this happen once before.
When I got them back they were installed the same way and the car was trailered to the drag strip and run for one pass. I did not run the car anymore at the track because I had a small oil leak and I did not want to compromise the track surface. The car was never run on the road because I did not have insurance on it. The car was started to load and unloaded from the trailer once more.
I taped the headers up and removed them again so I could pull the engine to replace all the gaskets and when I pulled the tape off the headers this time it pulled the ceramic coating off in quite a few places.
At first it looked like the sticky tape residue had stuck to the header but it was the rough coating underneath where the shiny ceramic coating had pulled off. The coating was stuck to the tape.
I contacted Michael again to tell him what happened and he told me I had voided the warranty because in his opinion the headers must have been overheated at the track but that is not the case and the headers show no signs of overheating.
Michael stands by his coaters 100% saying they are top tier.
Michael said he would coat them again for free but I would have to pay the shipping both ways.
Since I am in Canada I did not think this was a good idea since two previous attempts at coating had failed and shipping is not cheap.
His other option was to refund my money and to be honest I dont know any other company that would offer that but if I did that my only other option would be to order TTI headers and I would have to have the exhaust reworked to fit them. Looking further into the TTI headers I found quite a few people that were unsatisfied with the TTI coatings so I ruled out that option.
My third choice was to have them recoated locally.
I ended up taking my headers to Fireball Coatings in Ontario and when they looked at them they told me the headers were not overheated. They took a special gauge and measured the ceramic coating and it was .001 and then showed me a measurement of their coating on another customers header and their coating was .0027 to .003. They also said that where the coating had been pulled off by the tape it looked like there was some kind of undercoating and further told me the ceramic coating should be applied to the bare metal.
I left the headers at Fireball to be stripped and recoated which cost me $254.
If I had to do it again I would not pay for ceramic coated headers, I would buy them bare and have them coated locally.
Im not sure if anyone else has had problems with the coating on their Schumacher headers.
The first picture is from the first time before Schumacher recoated them.
The second picture is the second time after they had been recoated again by Schumacher and after the tape pulled the coating off.
View attachment header.jpg
View attachment 2014_04020001.JPG
I will say that their headers fit really nice and there customer service is excellent.
About two years ago I purchased a set of Schumacher headers for my Dart 440 swap to replace the painted B-Body headers that were on it when I bought the car. There were no issues with the paint peeling on these B-Headers but they had dings all over for clearance.
I wrapped the new Schumacher headers in cardboard and tape so they wouldnt get scratched during the install.
After getting the car running for less than 30 minutes the car was stored away in an unheated dry garage for the winter season.
When I pulled the car out the following spring I noticed the headers were showing what looked like rust pit marks showing through the coating so I took pictures and sent them to Michael to get his opinion.
Michael said he would pay for shipping back to him and back to me and he would coat them again and return them and that is what happened. He told me at that time he had only seen this happen once before.
When I got them back they were installed the same way and the car was trailered to the drag strip and run for one pass. I did not run the car anymore at the track because I had a small oil leak and I did not want to compromise the track surface. The car was never run on the road because I did not have insurance on it. The car was started to load and unloaded from the trailer once more.
I taped the headers up and removed them again so I could pull the engine to replace all the gaskets and when I pulled the tape off the headers this time it pulled the ceramic coating off in quite a few places.
At first it looked like the sticky tape residue had stuck to the header but it was the rough coating underneath where the shiny ceramic coating had pulled off. The coating was stuck to the tape.
I contacted Michael again to tell him what happened and he told me I had voided the warranty because in his opinion the headers must have been overheated at the track but that is not the case and the headers show no signs of overheating.
Michael stands by his coaters 100% saying they are top tier.
Michael said he would coat them again for free but I would have to pay the shipping both ways.
Since I am in Canada I did not think this was a good idea since two previous attempts at coating had failed and shipping is not cheap.
His other option was to refund my money and to be honest I dont know any other company that would offer that but if I did that my only other option would be to order TTI headers and I would have to have the exhaust reworked to fit them. Looking further into the TTI headers I found quite a few people that were unsatisfied with the TTI coatings so I ruled out that option.
My third choice was to have them recoated locally.
I ended up taking my headers to Fireball Coatings in Ontario and when they looked at them they told me the headers were not overheated. They took a special gauge and measured the ceramic coating and it was .001 and then showed me a measurement of their coating on another customers header and their coating was .0027 to .003. They also said that where the coating had been pulled off by the tape it looked like there was some kind of undercoating and further told me the ceramic coating should be applied to the bare metal.
I left the headers at Fireball to be stripped and recoated which cost me $254.
If I had to do it again I would not pay for ceramic coated headers, I would buy them bare and have them coated locally.
Im not sure if anyone else has had problems with the coating on their Schumacher headers.
The first picture is from the first time before Schumacher recoated them.
The second picture is the second time after they had been recoated again by Schumacher and after the tape pulled the coating off.
View attachment header.jpg
View attachment 2014_04020001.JPG
