PTS-BRG

After careful consideration and many hours of comparisons between all available vendors, I decided to install a set of Kline zirconium coated headers on my 991.2 Targa GTS.

I would like to thank Felix at Kline as well as Sam at By Design for not only shipping quickly (4 days from Romania), but offering me a full refund for anything I purchased that I was unhappy with. We had email, text and phone conversations about what I wanted to accomplish, my budget and the pros and cons of changing specific parts. I also purchased a complete Kline exhaust that will be reviewed and dyno tested in the very near future, but for now this thread is specifically devoted to the headers.

Full Disclosure: I was given a standard Rennlist member discount and received neither free parts nor any financial compensation for this review.

Kline is a Romanian based Company that has been in business for as long as I can remember, certainly for over a decade. They specifically make exhaust parts for high end cars like Porsche, Mclaren, Lamborghini, Ferrari, etc. They offer these parts in all sort of exotic materials like Inconel, Titanium, Carbon Fiber and 304 Stainless Steel. As far as I know, this is all they do.. exhausts and headers is all they make and they call themselves the “Exhaust Boutique.”

I decided to go with everything 304 stainless steel. I am not tracking the car, I don’t care about the weight savings and the minimal (if any) performance gains from the exotic materials was certainly not worth the premium for me. The prices for the Inconel, Titianium and Carbon Fiber systems were easily DOUBLE the price as the Stainless and these parts aren’t cheap in Stainless Steel to begin with.

Let me start with the dyno test and photos of the car BEFORE the headers were installed. The car has a COBB Stage 1 tune as well as the Soul 200 cats which I already reviewed and LOVE. The only other aftermarket part is the BMC Air Filter. Running pump 93 octane here in CT.

Dyno testing was done at “The Shop” which is a high performance shop in Norwalk, CT with an All Wheel Mustang Dyno. For those unaware, Mustang Dynos read 15-17% lower than Dynojets so the numbers on the chart need to be adjusted UPWARD by 15-17% to be in line with Dynojet Dyno charts. Big thanks to Jimmy (The owner) who took special care of my car and did multiple runs. He is in the process of moving to a brand new, state of the art facility and things were hectic, but he managed to get some great numbers and explained everything to me step by step. If you are looking for a really top dyno shop, check him out..













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The car produced 461hp and 436ft/torque. Using a 15% compensation, that’s 530hp and 501 torque. I was very impressed with the numbers I saw and was actually a little surprised with the power with only a mild Stage 1 tune and no real performance parts aside from the Soul Cats.

On to the headers themselves..

PTS-BRG

The headers I purchased were made of 304 Stainless Steel that were 2 stage zirconium coated to keep the heat within the headers. This coating is similar, but not exactly the same as the swain tech coating used by other manufacturers. I will let Sam or Felix chime in on the differences and advantages, but I think it is proprietary and is plasma applied. The pipes themselves have a sandpaper like surface and each one has its own serial numbered plate that I obscured for this review.

Construction was excellent. I took photos of the insides of both ends of the headers, but its not an easy pic to take and requires bright light. I did my best














Also, some comparison pics of the stock header and Kline header.

PTS-BRG

Finally, we have the installation. Tommy at P1 Motorcars in Stamford is just an insanely great mechanic and he's the only one I let touch the car. He said the installation wasn't so bad, but that a couple of the header bolts had to be removed and then reinstalled to get the headers off and the new ones installed. The drivers side especially was more difficult. Not a big deal, I was charged for 2 hours of work and that was fine by me.

I would like to point out that the design of the Klines DO NOT sit below the rear cross member of the car. They are protected by the cross member and cannot catch on anything. They do sit lower than the factory headers, but this is to be expected as the design of all aftermarket headers are different than the factory headers. Three pipes need to be bended so, they will all sit at different lengths.

Its like a work of art to me

The final sound was very similar to the before to my ears. I was expecting it to be louder or have a much different sound. There was a change and it was certainly for the better. The header change created a deeper and more naturally aspirated sound. Less turbo like which most feel is a great thing. It wasn't much louder at all but, to repeat what I Said in the Soul Cat review.. once you change out the factory cats the sound is drastically louder and extremely apparent to even novice ears. With the headers it was much less noticeable and overall more pleasant sounding, less harsh and less Japanese Fast and furious like some of the turbos sound. I like!!









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flsupraguy

I love your targa. Thank you for sharing. i had very similiar results with my gts with kline headers and a stage 1 tune on a mustang dyno.

medtech_expat

Thanks for the comprehensive write-up. I have my full Kline Inconel system (headers, 200 cell cats, exhaust) currently on their way to me, and together with basic666 will be doing a head-to-head "headers-only" dyno comparison with our otherwise bone-stock GTS's.

arter

So I assume that was a before dyno and that you will be doing an after dyno on the stage 1 tune.

PTS-BRG

The dyno test for the Kline Headers will be done this Tuesday, so expect to see what the gains are Tuesday. Just couldn't get the dyno and mechanic on the same page as both are super busy and wanted to get this review up with pics to get the ball rolling and maybe create a little hype. The exhaust will go on late Tuesday (I Hope) and the final dyno test will be done when stage 2 is released with pro tuning to get everything optimized. I did this in this order ONLY to see how the headers perform compared to other manufacturers claims and compared to a baseline reading on my car for the forum to see.

I will say that the straw that made me change the headers was actually the reports on the new 992. Porsche has squeezed more HP out of the same motor, in part by changing the headers.
If Porsche has established that a new header design can improve the HP then they are indirectly admitting it isnt the greatest design to begin with.

Without seeing any head to head dyno numbers, I would be willing to bet that all of the aftermarket headers improve on the stock headers and that overall they will produce similar results.
I made my decision to go Kline in part because they are the only ones that have a complete setup designed specifically for the 991.2 No other vendor has headers, cats and exhaust so this was a factor.
When a company makes each component and they are designed to work together then it is more like a factory system. Using a cat from here, a header from there and an exhaust from a third manufacturer seemed less than ideal, but that doesn't mean you can't get better or similar results doing it that way. I will say again I LOVE my Soul cats and will be sadly selling them as soon as the Kline system is installed as the Kline requires their own cats.

Not to beat a dead horse, but since this is a new thread based just on headers (and its my thread) the other factors that lead me to selecting Kline:

1. Ease of purchase and return policy by Sam at By Design/Kline and knowing if the headers are not what I want that he would take them back.
2. Price was somewhat of a factor. Kline prices were in line with nearly all of the other manufacturers and I felt thats what headers "should" cost in SS. Any more or less was a red flag to me.
3. Design. I was not willing to risk having my header snag something backing up or moving forward. I needed to know it was protected by the rear cross beam. The Kline's tuck up nicely and are protected.
4. The Company and History. Kline has been doing this for 10 years. They are established and well respected. Never heard a horror story about them yet and they manufacture for the highest performing cars in the world .
5 Transparency. They don't make any claims they wont back up. Kline never told me the headers will make ?? HP. Kline urged me to test them. They asked me to please post the results. They WANTED the information made public. No smoke and mirrors, I respect a company that is willing to stand behind their product and is confident in what the results will be.

All of these factors gave me the confidence I needed to move forward. The final piece of the puzzle will be revealed Tuesday when we all see how the headers perform on the same car, in the same location and on the same dyno. The only thing that changed will have been the header...

arter

Great.... maybe also do a run with the cobb running back with the stock tune ( for the non cobbers?)

Rennolazine

arter

With the stock tune I would agree. With the Cobb stage 1, might be nothing ( until they do the stage 2).

SamboTT@ByDesign

basic666

Nice setup! Digging the targa and man those soul cats look awfully tempting.

I would like to dig into the "whole set" concept a bit more. Is there any scientific reasoning / facts besides more of a feel good factor?

Psorcery

More power. Stock cats are very restrictive.

basic666

I meant getting everything from the same brand, vs say, pairing headers from one company and cats from another and exhaust from another.

to quote PTS

PTS-BRG

I cannot attest to their being any scientific reasoning, but I can give you my thought process on it..

When a header manufacturer (for example) designs a header, they do so around the factory parts. It is optimized based on the other parts in the car which will all be oem factory parts.
They cannot make the part optimized for another manufactures cats or exhaust because they dont know if the customer buying their header will have one of the other manufacturers cats or exhaust.
If they could design their part to perform better based on the other parts performing better, then the whole system should perform better because each piece is designed and optimized based on the other parts.

Now you can bet that the people making headers, cats and exhausts will most likely tell you that this isnt the case, I believe the reason they will dispute this is that not a single one of them sells all of the parts (cats/header/exhaust) so they have to. ONLY Kline sells it all. Now that being said, if you dont plan on doing the entire system by Kline then you are no worse off going one part at a time and picking the one you like best, or performs best or costs the least. But, from a purely design perspective, the Kline was designed to work hand in hand with the other Kline parts so I am expecting a refined and perfectly fitting system.