Another exhaust question

[joemcfarnham]

Good day, I have read through many exhaust threads on here but i cant quite seem to decide what to do, 1987 crown vic wagon with single exhaust atm. The cats are rattling from the inside and the flanges are going on them, Im looking at swaping the entire exhaust system when i pull the engine to change the oil pan sometime in the near future, with a strict budget in mind and wanting a quiet exhaust what is my best bet for gaining some horsepower/fuel economy?

[mrltd]

2.25" dual from manifolds back is good. Or stock replacements from the headers to the cats and 2.25" dual back from the cats back.

[joemcfarnham]

what size are the stock mustang headers?

[mrltd]

Small, but better than the cast manifolds... Poke around for exhuast threads/info. There has been tons of them.

[gadget73]

Mustang stock headers are also a fair bit lighter than the iron pieces of junk, so there is that benefit too.

[88Vic]

Mustang headers, 2.25" piping all the way back and any cheap turbo style mufflers flow better then stock and are just a little louder then stock mufflers. An offroad H-pipe is cheap too without the cats and with turbo mufflers it still won't be loud without cats.

[ss_mini14]

2.25" pipes all the way until just in front of the rear wheels maybe. anything to eliminate that crap they had going over the rear axle will help.

[1987cp]

Mustang stock headers are also a fair bit lighter than the iron pieces of junk, so there is that benefit too.

+1 ... and cheap .... far less ugly .... and WAY easy to install. Even I can do it!

Seriously, the 2.5" stuff seems to be easier to come by, but I've been constantly battling excessive exhaust noise on my wagon (as torquelover has pointed out, the back of the car is like one huge echo chamber for any interior resonance you pick up), so I can't really recommend a 2.5" dual exhaust with headers and no cats if you want to hear yourself think. Do you know yet how much power you're looking to make down the road? Dual 2.25" is supposed to be sufficient for quite a lot of what's out there ... in fact, one of my systems on an engine that ought to make about 250hp I really want to "downgrade" to a 2.25" crossover pipe if I ever have the extra bucks to do so, even if it means scouring catalogs for adapters and mandrel bends so I can piece it together at home. Direct-replacement Mustang H pipes really do work (I even have Mustang tailpipes on my car because I didn't know at the time to get Impala SS pipes instead), but stuff guys have custom-made for the Panther chassis fits a lot better. Terminating the exhaust ahead of the rear axle is cheap and somewhat easy depending on how you do it, but tailpipes exiting all the way to the back help with the noise issue as well.

[Lincolnmania]

my vic has 2.5" with no cats......it's fairly tame sounding

[1987cp]

torquelover's car is relatively quiet inside too, and he even has the original Flowmaster 40 Series on it, and no crossover pipe! Granted, I found out his tails are only 2.25" ... and oddly, he says it's a bit louder since he added cats with 2.25" downpipes instead of the 2.5" that had been on there. I'm definitely planning to try out his suggestion that welding stuff up raises the system's resonant frequency, reducing the annoying resonance I've been whining about since forever.

[Lincolnmania]

welding up the entire system......good idea.....i welded some of superlincolns exhaust (it drones a bit at certain rpm's) but i did not weld it all because i had a not so good welder at the time.....it's even got two cats, an x pipe, two mufflers, and two resonators. i'll have to try welding up the remaining clamped joints, and see if that helps

[1987cp]

You have your resonators out back like I do? What type of mufflers do you have for resonators? I want to eventually replace these cheap glasspacks with something better (and shorter) ...

I was thinking about maybe brazing the system instead of welding, since that's easier to undo. Might be expensive with my tiny torch, though.

[Lincolnmania]

it has a pr of summit glasspacks directly behind the impala ss tailpipes....also has summit polished stainless turbos and a bassani catted x pipe and motorsport ceramic headers.....you'll have to watch for pics....doing the control arm bushings.....got the bolts freed on two arms and i got one out.....neck kinked again ugha

[cld783]

peoples opinions of loud vary quite a bit it seems.

[torquelover]

That's true. It was funny to see Michael covering his ears when I gave the POS a few revs.

Scott, your exhaust setup sounds awesome. Hopefully I can see your car in person some day.