Could I use some sort of I beam (metal) header?

Use a correctly-sized steel lintel.

Chris,

I'm in a very similiar situation. My basement is 7'.25" from cement to the bottom of the joists. The house is balloon construction, 2x4 wall studs go from the foundation to the roof. Because of the balloon construction, I need an 8' header, but it can't be more than 4" tall. I'm probably going to go with some engineered lumber and rebuild that portion of the wall with the rough-in as a 2x6 wall. #50 from betterheader (http://www.betterheader.com/ibeam.asp) looks like a possibility.

Did you find a solution for a short header? Worthy's suggestion of a steel lintel is the second time I've come across that as a solution, but I haven't found any information on using that with wood construction.

Thanks
Andrew