Thanks Sam.

Unfortunately, the initials run up the flag poll, are also MY initials.

Bill , This thread needs to be moved to the general boating discussion section to gain maximum exposure . Your nerves have got to be completely frayed . Put the mighty power of OSO to work .

heres my opinion....cmi dont have the balls to stand up and make it rite,,this is why im saying this,,remember all the 500 efi headers they never did anything about?? their as bad as pantera..

prove me wrong CMI...

Call CMI and tell them to come over and " help " you install them ...

Have you tried using a "crows foot" wrench? They make 12pt and 6pt. The 12pt are harder to find.
Here is an ebay link to what I am talking about.
http://www.ebay.com/itm/Snap-On-Crow...#ht_508wt_1255
I have a full set at the house I would ship to you and let you try but unfortunately I am traveling for work right now.
I have made a crows foot out of a 12pt combination wrench and it worked just fine. Just cut part of the circle on your combination wrench so ends up looking like a "C" instead of a circle.

youneed to go back and really read what bill wrote,,theirs no room for a 6 point hex headed bolt..crows foot wont work either..the only bolt that fits is a button allen head bolt...

My reference was to a 12pt crows foot. Incase you arent aware, those are also used on 12pt bolts.
Just trying to help but I guess I should have directed my advice toward bill and not the peanut gallery.

You need to be able to actually get a bolt in the hole before you need a wrench . Straight from the peanut gallery .

When you say "YOU need to be able....." I am not the one with the problem, so no I do not need to be able to do anything. Simply making a suggestion on something else to try. Since aparently some of you havent seen 12pt crows feet and it looks like his 12pt bolts do fit in the holes, he just cant get a wrench on them to tighten them. His pictures look like the the bolts are in the holes.
Can I ask who is the one with the problem here? Seems we have 2 guys that are so involved in this situation they feel the need to comment for the guy with the problem. Come on now guys, I'm sure your boats have issues you should be worrying about instead of speaking your mind for someone else.

Thank you very much for the suggestion, and the offer.

I have some additional pictures that will more clearly demonstrate my dilemma.

A member on one of the DONZI enthusiast sites also has some CMI headers on a 383 SBC. He posted some pictures of his headers for me to use as a comparison.

You can see in his header, there is actually a measurable amount of header pipe between the mounting flange and the water jacket pipe.



Now examine MY pipes in the same location. There is no pipe visible, and the welds look like they are overlapping each other.




As a test, I wanted to see how much of the bolt head/shoulder I would have to remove to get the bolt to fit properly. As you can see, the bolt head is still almost touching the header pipe.



This is a comparison between an untouched bolt, and the one I ground down. I had to remove about half of the head to get it to fit. If I were to shorten a HEX bolt this much, there wouldn't be enough left for an open end wrench to bite for proper torque. Go back to the "correct" CMI picture, and look at the clearance those bolts have.



I have sent CMI an email with this information, and presented a couple of options as to how we are going to proceed. I also told him that I had been posting honestly, and without emotion, about this experience, and that I was going to post how it was resolved.

I have lost some confidence in them, if it takes them 3 sets of headers to build a set like I ordered, and that can be mounted correctly. I will let everyone know what the next step is.

Thanks for all the suggestions, and support. I believe I have gone beyond what could be expected to try and make this work.