dual exhaust happyfungoodtime thread

[1990LTD]

What would you do in my situation? Stock lopo 5.0 with stock single pipe.


I want duals. I was hoping to do this piece by piece but didn't know about incompatibilities between some of the parts I've been looking at so I'm asking advice from the educated masses.

I want:

- bigger than stock tailpipes that are also angled downward...I really like the stock look but bigger than 2" will sound beefier if I understand correctly - If I don't have that (or anything) right, tell me. If these style pipes aren't available in anything bigger than 2" and I need some shiny metal cylinders sticking out the back end of my car, I won't lose any sleep over it. They will be going on the end of some glasspacks. Like I said, correct me if I'm wrong on the bigger pipes = beefier sound.

- cheap

- better sound than what's coming out the back end of it now

- my engine to breathe better (if even slightly) than it is with the stock pipe on it now. I'm not expecting huge power gains from this, obviously.


I don't need:

- high end performance parts. Like I said, I'm doing this as cheaply as I possibly can, and this is not going behind a big HP motor, just the LOPO doorstop that we know and (sometimes) love.




Should I, in my inexperience, just go to the most reputable exhaust shop around here and have them make me something? I am assuming they would be putting an H pipe on in the stock (also assuming here) 2" unless told otherwise? Is that right? Is a direct replacement H pipe even available for these cars in larger sizes?

Again, I'm really sorry for so many n00b questions about this stuff.


What would you do in my situation? Want better sound, slightly better flow and another pipe sticking out of my car

[pantera77]

On a stock lopo, and for what your doing, I'd just get a stock h-pipe, stock tails, some glasspacks or cheap turbo style mufflers, and some nice 3" chrome tips.

[Brandon]

Yeah, or you can go to a muffler shop and tell them that you want a balancer tube (H pipe) and they will install it for you. They usually use bigger pipes if you're going with a exhuast upgrade.

[Leo]

What would you do in my situation? Stock lopo 5.0 with stock single pipe. -Like I said, I'm doing this as cheaply as I possibly can

cheap deal will only lead to tears.....



mine was done cheap and it leaks around the welds and this hole....

if you get it cheap make sure its done right!

[gadget73]

Are you planning to keep it stock or no? If its staying stock, put stock exhaust on it with better mufflers. If you think you might want to upgrade to an HO, see about stock 95 Impala tailpipes instead of stock tails. They ought to be 2 1/4" instead of the standard 2". The exhaust is otherwise not bad for a stock engine, and the parts just fit in there as they should.

[1990LTD]

Are you planning to keep it stock or no? If its staying stock, put stock exhaust on it with better mufflers. If you think you might want to upgrade to an HO, see about stock 95 Impala tailpipes instead of stock tails. They ought to be 2 1/4" instead of the standard 2". The exhaust is otherwise not bad for a stock engine, and the parts just fit in there as they should.

Yep gonna keep it stock unless I come into a large amount of $$ somehow. If that should happen I wouldn't think twice about tearing out my glasspacks and new stock exhaust in favor of something nice....but until then, it's a grandma car

[P72Ford]

I chopped this from andymac0035's thread from some time ago...

On a stock low output 5.0, I would think 2" pipes are more than adequate.

Really, if I was trying to build a decent cat-back on the cheap that would last and provide decent performance...

I'd start by obtaining an OEM h pipe from a whale.

For my burnout car:
I took the h pipe off a 2004 P71, which was stainless. I sectioned the h, as originally the distance between pipes, center to center, is wider on the whale. Once narrowed, the h pipe flanges mate perfectly with the low output converter flanges.

On the burnout car, I just extended the h pipe and dumped the exhaust out the passenger's side.

But, for a more practical build, get a quality set of mufflers, and adapt them in. Then use OEM stainless tailpipes. You can probably find a decent whale exhaust (h and tails) in the junkyard. I got my h from an '04 P71 parts car my Dad has. But, my Dad's '99 whale also has stainless h and tails, so I'd say you can crib stainless exhaust parts from any whale.

It won't be overkill, it will sound good, look factory, and perform better.

This comes from a person who has paid alot of money for custom exhaust in the past. I spent 400 on the catback for my car (2.5"/ Flowmasters), and the quality was garbage. I paid another $400 for decent catted front pipes.

Ideally, aftermarket cat backs are the best (have one on my truck), but there are none for a box panther. But, any aftermarket cat back that isn't stainless rusts up and turns to crap anyway, like the one on my truck (stainless next time around).

Thats why I say you can't go wrong with oem stainless parts. Looks good, and lasts.

Also, regarding that mess on your exhaust, Leo. The shop should have known to bend the hanger around the bottom side of the pipe, so that is is better supported, and the vibration won't break the weld.

I actually had that same thing happen on a cat back of mine though. The lack of common sense is somewhat surprising.

[1987cp]

Are you planning to keep it stock or no? If its staying stock, put stock exhaust on it with better mufflers. If you think you might want to upgrade to an HO, see about stock 95 Impala tailpipes instead of stock tails. They ought to be 2 1/4" instead of the standard 2". The exhaust is otherwise not bad for a stock engine, and the parts just fit in there as they should.

The tailpipes listed in the Walker catalog for '94-'96 B-bodies are all 2" IIRC. Might check with a Maremont supplier, since their stuff is sometimes bigger than the Walker equivalent (as with the S-10 midpipe experiment).

[andymac0035]

I chopped this from andymac0035's thread from some time ago...

........and I wish I had heeded your advice.

[P72Ford]

........and I wish I had heeded your advice.

The job you had done looked pretty decent.

Being that we are car people, it is almost impossible to find a shop that does a perfect job (in our opinions) at a fair price.

[pvillese]

I chopped this from andymac0035's thread from some time ago...

That is what I plan to do when I fix my exhaust.

[1990LTD]

509 for duals w/ cherry bomb glasspacks, all 2", with the cats chopped off. Just two straight pipes from the manifolds and he's going to make everything himself besides the mufflers and tails.

[pantera77]

That's not really that great of a deal, but if your happy with it.....

[andymac0035]

That's not really that great of a deal, but if your happy with it.....

X2

[mercman1951]

You could just bolt on dual tips to your back bumper and be done with it...

If I were in your situation, I would go to Napa and ask for a complete, cat-back stock dual exhaust setup (minus mufflers) for a 1990 crown vic with the towing package. I would order some cheap Turbo II's or similar from Summit or Jegs. All that right there will be in the neighborhood of $300 or so. You won't miss (or notice) the extra diameter size of a custom setup. You might need a couple of lengths of straight pipe to connect up the mufflers- it will be a cut to fit deal since the new mufflers will be shorter than the stock ones.

I'd jack up the car onto jack stands, cut off the old crap with a Sawzall, snap off the bolts to the cats, cuss a lot, torch off the rusty studs, install new studs, piece everything together, use all new hangers and mig-weld up as much as I could get to.

Then I would sit back and wonder why I didn't pay someone to do it, and explain to myself I saved a couple hundred bucks for wasting a weekend on my back on a cold garage floor.

I do like the other suggestion too about using the PI stuff from a junkyard.