Custom H pipe question, need experienced advice

[85_SS_302_Coupe]

My buddy has an S10 that currently has straight pipes on it and we're looking to make a crossover pipe for it (basically an H pipe). What i'm curious about is, does it matter how long that crossover pipe is? On most Mustang H pipes you see, the pipes come together and the " - " in the middle is only 6 inches long or so....with his, the pipes come straight off the headers so that crossover will be at least as wide as the headers are, which i figure is at least a foot and a half wide. We're trying to be as cheap cost wise as possible so we're trying to avoid getting into mandrel bends and making it all by scratch..we just wanna weld in a crossover and go but we're unsure if it'll be ok being that long.

[06hoss]

Hey David, I think you will be OK making them that way. Basically, the smaller the H crossover is, the better it works, but the difference isn't that large. There is only about a 5 HP difference up top from a stock H pipe to an X pipe
(on an 05+ GT...so your car will be different, but you get the idea). A longer H pipe would be a very minor change from the stock H.
When I had my stock front pipes on, they came close together like you said and the H crossover was less than 6 inches long. I now have American Racing long tubes on the car with their H pipe crossover and the crossover is longer than the stock one was since it crosses over before the main pipes come all the way back together in the middle. The reason they do it this way is you don't want the crossover too far back from where the collectors dump out since they won't won't work as well if it's too far back.
I hope this helps.