RB & BB exhaust manifolds the same?

[Squeaker Toy]

I'm going to be breaking in a new engine and need to pick up some exhaust manifolds for my 440. I wanted to know if anyone knows if the exhaust manifolds on a 383 will work on my 440 since I know where a truck is sitting with some on it?

[hy_desert_4wheeler]

I'm going to be breaking in a new engine and need to pick up some exhaust manifolds for my 440. I wanted to know if anyone knows if the exhaust manifolds on a 383 will work on my 440 since I know where a truck is sitting with some on it?


Yes they are the same.. the heads are shared by the two engines..

[Elwenil]

Yes and no, actually. Just about all of them will swap around with no problems on the heads, but it's the engine and chassis combo that is important. You should have no problems, since your set is off a truck, and is going back in a truck. Most of the car manifolds will not work, but I have seen a few creative guys rig some stuff up, like using two passenger side car manifolds and having the driver's side pipe dump at the front and wrap back around. Messy. Figured I'd point that out so some noob doesn't think he can use the manifolds off his grandmother's Newport...

[Squeaker Toy]

thx guys.

Ok I went to get these manifolds and ran into a little problem. the center two bolts or nuts are deep inside holes of the manifold and I couldn't determine what, if in fact they are, hex head bolts. I used 1/4 drive sockets and the biggest I could get in was a 7/16...the half inch socket was to fat to get into the hole. I tried all the way down to 1/4 inch and nothing seems to fit. The nuts from the other manifold studs would just barely fit into the hole.. I can't see how you could get any socket around them once they were in the hole.

Is there a specialty tool to get the 2 center fasteners out of a RB exhaust manifold? Is it a very thin wall 1/2" socket?

[76dodgecrew4u]

Well from the factory the are supposed to have a long nut called a "barrel nut" with a 9/16" head. Get a flash light and make sure there are even nuts let alone studs down in there (sometime when pulling barrel nuts they are so stuck, the stud will just break). A standard 3/8" thread nut will not fit down in there. Now there are some "off the wall" 3/8" nuts that take a 1/2" socket but bottom line is.... check to see if anything is in the hole. I have had some manifolds that once I get all the nuts off they'll still stick either its on the threads of studs or some times the manifolds are just "stuck on" ie. bi-metallic corrosion (some persuasion with a mallet helps). This is just my experience maybe it will help you.

For the "noobs" you can use a car manifold on the passenger side, but you have to notch the top of the frame in roughly 2" I recommend a car HP style (67-70) if you go that way. The driver side is just center dump only unless you want to heat the brake lines, prop valve and starter as it is very very tight because the frame.