Crucial Racing is doing P&P exhaust manifolds for $200 and ceramic coated, but does it make good power? A plus to me would be keeping the deep boxer sound if it is worth it. I hear their uppipes are one of the best you can purchase now, for not a bad price either. I think I will be purchasing their uppipe very soon, was going to get a Perrin uppipe, but found out Perrin is a much narrower diameter 1.62, and heats up #3 cylinder. The Crucial Racing is 1.75in. diameter, and ceramic coated, and costs less . Let me know if anyone is running a Crucial Racing set-up, and if you like it.
You'll only lose the 'boxer sound' if you go to equal length headers. I've too seen a lot of positive comments on ported stock manifolds. Don't know of any hard numbers indicating they're clearly superior though. As to uppipes.. bigger isn't necessarily better. And I don't know of anybody who's cooked their #3 cylinder with a Perrin; just a bunch of people claiming it happens. Ceramic coated is definitely a bonus though.
and you may want to look into equall lenght headers any way. gp moto's can be found for around 649 at some websites and they claim to equalize cylinder temps and +15whp. personally i'd wave bye-bye the the boxer sound for that.
Not me, just P&P my stock STi manifold, and it turned out pretty good, even painted it with red ceramic paint. I'll post pic's if anyone is interested.
Here is the finished product, keep in mind it's my first one I have done. Now I am moding my TGV's, I will keep you all posted on how that goes.