Ceramic Coating and/or Header Wrap?
 

I did some searching and could not find a discussion about this topic,
In the interest of reducing cabin temperature I learned about ceramic coating and insulating wrap of header and exhaust components as solutions to this concern. Also, I read that they will provide more engine operating efficiency, reduce under hood temperatures, etc.
What are your direct experiences with these solutions? Did you achieve the benefits you wanted? There is a Jet-Hot coating shop not far from my office. FWIW, I'm running a Racing Beat 4-1 header and custom stainless 2.5" exhaust, and my car is Rotrex supercharged making 195rwhp. It's primary function is track use in time trial / HPDE.
Thanks for any help!

I can't provide any empirical evidence of reduced underhood temps, but I can say a good coating should help, as well as keeping things looking spiffy. Wrap probably contains more heat and I bought wrap, and wrapped my RB header, but before even installing it I decided I hated the wrap and had it coated instead.

After 3 years of HPDE/TT use it still looks new:

https://live.staticflickr.com/65535/...c1647d51_c.jpg

#1 Header shield made out of stainless with airspace between header and shield.
#2 ceramic coating both inside and out (works fine with or without above shield, better with shield).

Every header wrap or header blanket I've used reduces the life of the header.
Tight wrapped header tubes kills them quickest but...
You can grab wrapped headers with your bare hands after a serious beating and not burn your hands.
Header wrap works BEST for keeping heat out of engine compartment by a huge margin.
It just kills the header quickly.
Non-stainless headers last less than 1 year.
Stainless last a bit longer but not much.
If you assume the header is a consumable part the warp works far better than anything else...
Blankets extend this life a bit (as they allow some airflow to header) but kill them just like the wrap.
The wrap (if done right) looks best IMO.

Our experience echoes TNinja's.
Air gapped metal shield or thermal blanket on trans tunnel
Internally and externally coated header. According to our coater, something like 85% of the thermal insulation comes from the first coat, inner or outer, take your pick. IOW, the 80/20 benefit is just doing one side and external is usually cheaper.
Insulated matting inside car also makes a huge difference.

For N/A builds, we usually do bonded thermal matting inside tunnel, external coating on header and first section of exhaust under driver and floor mat. For F/I builds we add internal coating to downpipe and do air gapped metal shield in tunnel instead of matting. F/I also gets the entire exhaust externally coated.

Keep in mind that the entire tub is a heat sink. So heating up the tub behind the driver will heat soak the interior just the same as heat from the engine bay.

One thing...
In all cases when I decided to have something exhaust related coated it was NEW!
I've never had used exhaust pieces coated...
Ask your coating shop about this before you take your used header in.
Might be difficult to coat the inside without some form of serious cleaning...

Good source for thin stainless sheet is discarded SS kitchen appliances.
I "skin" them like the buffalo hunters of the 19 century...
It's razor thin but can make nice heat shielding.

Question for Emillo:
Ever had used exhaust stuff coated?
How did it work out?

Used bits can be coated but need to be bead blasted. OEM heatshield material from other cars can usually be bent and cut to suit. Junkyard FTW.

The only coating I've seen that actually works and is durable is white lightning from Swaintech.

I agree with Arca_ex!

I just didn't have a source for this stuff.
Back in 1983 I got a job at Cartech engineering (Corky Bells first shop) as the lot lizard, low man on the totem pole, cleaned floors, got coffee, did the jobs that no one else wanted to do...
I didn't know it at the time but working for such a man when I was a mere pup helped me immensely.
Started me out RIGHT...
One of the jobs was to take stuff to John's Jaguar (now "Jags that Run") to have stuff coated.
The coating "rig" took up a whole bay in John's shop. It was what I'll call a "plasma coater".
It put that white stuff on MOLTEN, Imagine a airless paint system applying a coating that was 900+ degrees hot.
The bay looked like a disaster area. Huge shields to keep the crap out of the rest of the shop.
It was a serious set up.

The white coating was super thick, lasted FOREVER, but...
It was super sensitive to dirt. Any hand prints or oil left on the part during install would permanently stain the coating first time you got it hot.
You had to handle it with gloves, clean gloves.
Installed properly it stayed gorgeous white for a long long time and worked great as a ceramic barrier.
It was difficult to coat the inside of stuff with this method and Swaintech's page says this aspect is still a problem.

Thanks Arca_ex for the info. That's the stuff I prefer to use...

Thank you for all the helpful information!

@CoralDoc I will be at the NASA Homestead in two weeks and I have some exhaust heat shield material from a Mazda 3 if you're interested. let me know.

I'm not sure if "lot lizard" is actually the job that you think it is.

Being the Street Meat at Corky's shop around Quaker Cuervo Oats breakfast time sounds like a party.

Lot lizard and "molten hot white sprayer" in the same post is wild but at least you used protection I guess

Yep, I didn't realize the parameters of "lot lizard" for a long time.
Later, when I called a "shop assistant" a lot lizard he got "sand in his bits"...

I do know now but I still use the term incorrectly...

Here's another "Super Tech".
No one in an automotive shop wants to be called this.
It is a mark of ridicule...
"Here comes the super tech, lets watch him and see what he screws up next".
I cannot imagine calling my company "Super Tech".

You also DO NOT want to be called "Mr. Goodwrench" at a GM dealer, same reason.

When I was named "Technical Ninja" by my shop buddies years before the internet I didn't like being called it as well.

And another: Wallet Vampire, anyone care to guess what this is?

I didn't know it then but Corky's shop was one of the best working environments I ever had in the automotive realm. High quality people, good tools, limited BS.
Stout engineering support.

Corky would take the whole shop out at Christmas to a nice Mexican joint in Dallas, that WAS a party...