Jason Heffner saves the day & JonB !!!!!!

[wiseasp]

Finally after towing my GTS down to Jasons in the rain on a flat bed tow truck, about 1 hour away, I was ready for my new Belanger headers and cat back.

After a few hours Jason and his other Tech ,Jason, had the car apart and was finishing putting the headers on when they noticed that not ALL of the parts were sent. He immediately called JonB. and was told that the parts would be there MONDAY!!!!

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The parts were MIA and would have to be fabricated and sent out Friday for delivery Monday.

Some tuners would have just given up and waited until Monday. NOT JASON!!! After about 3 hours of scrambling around to different garages, machine shops and muffler shops in the auto complex and using EVERY favor he had, they were able to fabricate the parts needed from SCRATCH.

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The job Jason did is unbelievable and looks awesome.

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I was there from 9:30 am to 7:00 pm. I watched Jason and he worked on the car like it was his own!! Not like some other tuners I've seen

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I am glad my money and Viper go to Jason. He has 100% of my business and my GTS one day will have HEFFNERS PERFORMANCE custom supercharger kit.


In this day and age there are ALOT of individuals out there posing as Viper Tuners/Tech. Jason Heffner is the REAL DEAL!!!

If you want an experienced Viper Tuner/Tech with REAL horsepower numbers, Jason is THE only one for you.

Thanks Jason, I appreciate your tenacity and experience and look forward to doing business with you in the future!!

ROB

 

[Mike Brunton]

Rob,

Good story - sounds like Jason really went the extra mile for you. It's nice to hear of the good tuners out there that make the Viper experience fun.

Did you talk to Jason about the supercharger? I wonder if he can put the supercharger on the motor you have with the cast pistons, or whether they swap the out for forged units? I'm curious of the forced induction guys do that on cast piston motors..???

I saw Jamie Furmans car at Englishtown last weekend, and I have to say it was a beautiful job on the supercharger, and I LOVE how it sounds on his car.

 

[wiseasp]

Mike,

Jason and I have already talked about the supercharger and he would switch to the forged pistons.

It is just GREAT to have some one tell you the way it is. I know Jason is not the type of tuner that will pi$$ in your ear and tell you it's raining!!!!!!!!!!

ROB

 

[Y2K5SRT]

Rob -

Let us know how much of a difference the Belanger headers make on your '01. There have been comments that the '00's and '01's don't see as much of a benefit with headers as the previous Vipers. I don't know that anybody has done a "before and after" dyno (may be too late if you didn't do a "before"). Please let us know how much of a difference it made for you. Thanks!

Chris

 

[treynor]

A number of us have done before -n- after tests of the Belanger headers. You can see mine at http://www.treynor.com/ViperMods.html

 

[Biff Brown]

WE are very fortunate to have Jason Heffner as a Fellow Club Va/Md member, I've met him personally and am TOTALLY impressed by his attitude towards Vipers, his work ethic and not to mention his knowledge....He DEFINATELY puts his customers first and his work is "Top Shelf"!!!

 

[wiseasp]

I am going to the drag strip tonight.

I can say 3 things right now. 1. from about 10 feet away you can feel the air RUSH out of the rear exhaust. 2 the sound is incredible, I thought the Viper turned heads before, but now it is even better and 3. once you open the hood and actually SEE the headers, not the heat shields, it can bring a tear to your eye. If I do not make any horsepower (I don't think that will be the case, since BTR guarantees 50 HP at the rear wheels) I am still pleased with the system!!!!

I do have to thank JonB for recommending this set up. I almost went with a different brand, but JonB asked what I wanted the car to sound like and this is even better than expected.

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[Y2K5SRT]

Rob -

I am really looking forward to your numbers! Best of luck at the strip tonight. Have you run there before? If so, what were your better times? Interested to see how they drop with the headers.

I have heard nothing but GREAT things about Jason and have enjoyed the few times we traded e-mails last year. I am curious about the lack of heat shields, as somebody mentioned you should always run with them or risk burned plug wires, etc. Tom at BTR said that the stock heat shields should fit over the Belangers from what I recall. That was my plan if/when I upgrade to these headers. Love to get your thoughts (or Jason's) on this.

Good luck tonight!

Chris

 

[Jason Heffner]

Thank you Rob for all of the nice things you've said. I'm really glad you like your Viper more now than before. You are truly a great person to deal with.

The stock heat shields did not go back on however the factory plug boot shields did fit back on nicely but we also added some heat proof spark plug boot socks to be safe. Belanger headers were definitely some of the nicest headers I've ever installed and the sound is unbeatable.

 

[treynor]

Rob,
Your setup sounds almost identical to my "BPU" modifications on my '01 RT. I went from 408 RWHP / 442 ft/lbs to 438 RWHP / 485 ft/lbs with those mods. The midrange torque improvement is quite noticeable with the Belanger vs stock system. I similarly deep-sixed the stock heat shields when I added Belanger headers, and used Snake Sox over 10.5mm Magnecor wires.
Two notes:
(1) your ECU needs time to adapt to the new flow characteristics, and you'll likely not see the full benefit of the parts you've added for a couple hundred miles. Don't be disappointed if you only pick 1 mph at the strip tonight.
(2) On your '01, you may get the 'check engine' light in the next couple thousand miles. The current recommended fix is to get your local dealer to install TSB 18-11-01, which is a JTEC controller update. An alternate fix is to install the MOPAR ECU, but I'd hold off on that at least until the updated ECU is available and someone tests it.

Enjoy your car!

 

[Y2K5SRT]

Rob - I have been just itching to hear how your runs at the drag strip went last night! While I agree with Ben in that your ECU may take a little while to adapt to the increased flow, I am still curious if you saw (or felt) any improvement. Be sure to let us know!

Ben - Took a peek at your web page and am VERY, very impressed with the way you have documented the horsepower as you added each item. That is extremely helpful to those of us that are contemplating upgrades. Speaking of which, it appears that you only picked up 16 horsepower from the Belanger headers and catback exhaust. I know that they have been "advertised" as picking up closer to 50. Is this the evidence of the "decreased impact" on the '00 and '01 engines? I would hate to drop $3,000 for 16 horsepower. Scratch that, I would NOT drop $3,000 for 16 horsepower. 50 horsepower, yes - 16, no. I have been lucky enough to turn similar horsepower and torque without the headers (435 rwhp/483 rwtq) but would consider them if it bumped those numbers up substantially. Of course, I am very impressed with the results of your BTR nitrous system and am eager to see how the Hennessey heads improve your numbers. Great stuff!!

Chris

 

[Tony Estes]

I also had the Belanger headers on my 96 GTS.I gained 51 RWHP. One thing you should all consider is putting the heat shields back on. After installing the headers without putting the heat shields back on(hate to hide those beautiful headers) we started to have our power steering line fail do to the excessive heat.After replacing the hi pressure line twice I put the heat shields back on and the problem went away. Part of the problem might have been all the road course racing we were doing. I wasn't using this viper anywhere but the track.

 

[treynor]

Chris,
I'm very happy to hear you found my webpage helpful. Being methodical and testing after each upgrade is the only way I know to figure out whether (and how well) a given upgrade actually works.

Regarding the Belanger system, it's important to note that I'm still running catalytic converters in my car. Tom's 50 HP figure is for cars running without cats. If you're going to install headers, I'd definitely recommend getting 3" high-flow cats to go with them. My car picked up an additional 9 HP and 10 ft/lbs of torque when I installed the cats after adding the Belangers, for a total of +23 HP / +37 ft/lbs over stock w/smooth tubes & filters. Still, it does appear that '00+ cars pick up less peak HP than do '99 and previous models.
It's not currently clear that ANY headers will do better than the Belangers for a stock-internals '00+ car, but Wayne is going to be testing the CDI headers in his stock-internals '01 ACR shortly, so we'll have a data point. There is some evidence that the CDI headers work better with higher-HP motors, and I'm using them in conjuction with the Hennessey heads and T&D lifters APEX is installing right now, so that will provide another data point. We're nearly there:

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