My dad bought a stick welder for $25 on yard sale.
It should be OK to weld, it is steel manifold, not iron.
????
I'll try. Who did?

 

Just buy a new one. They're cheap enough.

If you weld it with a 25 dollar arc machine I promise you'll be taking it back off in a couple months to swap on the one you bought.

 

Metal's too thin. You are going to make bigger holes. You won't be able to get to all the areas that are cracked.

Buy a new manifold.

 

Get an APN header. Stainless steel and under $150 from some sources.

 

It looks really ugly. And my welder broke. I have to buy MIG welder.
I'll let you know results.

 

I used about 10 rods.

 

You've added more metal to it now than the whole original header had in it.

 

you're new to welding I take it?

Read read and read some more. I'm a pretty good welder after years of trial and error, when I should have just researched.

O and practice on your friends stuff first

 

I painted manifold by silver high temp paint, installed it, there are no leaks.
I spent 10 rods to make sure it will not crack anymore, at least not were I repaired it. So far so good.

 

Are you adding heavy duty front coil springs to handle the extra weight?

 

Even with a stick welder i can weld that with a quarter of a rod but you got to what you got to do and by the looks of it it looks like you had the amperage to high heres a simple stick weld bead i layed for my rear 4 link im building

 

I'll weld extra steel to existing springs to reinforce them.

To Purple:
You are doing great, looks like professional job!

 

Well, I give you credit for the effort. lol It looks like you melted lead on there.

I have a mig and I have welded several exhausts. If the pipe itself is in good shape and the welds penetrated well then it will hold you over for a while. but if the pipe is corroded, porous, brittle and thin then it will only be temporary. If it were new pipe it would be a different story. In my experience it is the pipe that fails and the welds themselves are fine on used exhausts.

I have a Cherokee coming in a couple weeks that has a bad manifold and comes with a new one. I might investigate the old one just to see what it really looks like. Maybe I will through a weld on it and keep it for a spare or something. A new one is around $100 I believe.

 

The problem with the manifolds on these trucks is the motor moves to much and the the force has to go some were and it decides to go to the mani fold that cant move i have brown dog off road poly motor mounts and havent had an exhaust manifold crack since the motor cant move so much anymore

 

I'm glad someone brought up motor mounts. Seems as though most manifolds crack due to worn out motor and transmission mounts. Before you throw a manifold (either a new one or that old one with the fugly welds), check your mounts!