A new & improved thread on my exhaust joys. Making progress.

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Did alittle bit of calulating of needed cuts in the back side of the passenger side tail hoop over the axle to drop it to matchthe driver side. I'll need to drop 1.5"-2" to be close. Then was able to see where those inches were ment to be, the strait section before the up bend to the hoop is about 2" shorter than the driver side. If I add to that then the tail ends could be even at the bumper as they are not right now. It's amazing who crappy the QC Pypes has. Now to the down pipes. It is looking more that I'll have to work in a 2.25" section at the manifold flanges, too tight with the studs to run 2.5" there. Maybe I could see what ARP has & use some bolts in place of studs But I think the heads diameter might still be too big. For how tight I want to have the 45 deg bend on the passenger side I am thinking to run 2.25" to a 2.5" adapter to the cat. For the driver side I'll need a 80 or 85 deg bend but I can't find a pre bent 2.25" section anywhere, just in 2.5". The theory with 2.25" bends would be to take them to a shop to flair the ends out to fit the doughnuts, not having to adapt that close to the manifolds. As long as I have some steel pipe sections I'll hack them up until I figure the best combo for everything to work. Maybe I should open my own shop from all this over engineering I'm doing for manifolds.

 

[64nailhead]

Wow, just seen this. Nice to see a bolt on kit for the car fit so well ( 🙁 ), just kidding of course. You are strengthening my belief in buying generic pipes and making them myself.

Good luck - sincerely - Jim

 

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Now here is a question I'm going to toss out here, what is the general ground clearance of anyones exhaust in relationship to the frames ground clearance around the section along the rockers. Right now I'm sitting at 10" average clearance (checked at muffler inlet & outlet, half way between the muffler & X of X-pipe, half way between X & proposed cat location) but forgot what I got for the frame with out body. The reason for this is to see how my mock up down pipe is coming along so I can attempt to make one each in mandrel bent plain steel 2.25 & 2.5. I'm still trying to work out my theory to rub all 2.5 as the ARP bolt heads will clear the tight quarters (had a set of short ones that I used to try that idea out & they cleared.)

 

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I might of found a possible solution to my attempt for 2.5" pipes at the manifold flange. ARP has 12 point stainless nuts in 3/8-16 that uses 7/16 socket/wrench. I remounted the down pipes I have again & measured their ground clearance (which I should of done earlier) & got 12" at the lowest points.

 

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Here is the regular steel 2.25" test pipe I made for how the stainless one should go. Looks like I got about an inch or two needed to be trimmed out to get the ground clearance I want. I know I'll have to figure out how much of a difference there will be on the final product.

 

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Since I got all the needed adjustments/cut locations done on the passenger tail pipe I took off all the Pypes pieces so they are handy to do the needed work when/if I do it. So tossed on the Jegs kit using the Pypes mufflers for a better test fit with everyting in place up to the X-member (with the thread on this kit being popular motivated to give it another test fit.) I'm opting for the Pypes mufflers part on sound from video clips, part on being lighter than the Jegs mufflers. I'll even be using the tail pipe hangers from the Pypes kit for the test fit. The only issue I have ran into is the intermediate pipes hit/have a really tight fit against the G Force X-member but that's a superficial issue since they will need that end to be adapted to connect with the cats & down pipes. Everything does seem to sit higher than that how it should be since I have jack stands supporting everything. It does seem like this is the better route to go since I don't need to adapt a "made for it" part to work with the tail pipe, don't have to deal with a X-pipe, I do have the option to go with rear or quarter panel exits.

 

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Got in some of the pipes in. Now I'll have to get the 45 & 2.25"/2.5" connector cut down & flaired. The connector will work on the drivers side to fit the 2.5" 80 bend to the manifold. Now if I was smart enough to order the 80 when I did with everything else I could be getting somewhere.

 

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After some You Tube trolling I found a clip with a '79 Malibu that has the same type manifolds & using Flowmaster down pipes (p/n 81068).

Now I'm trying judge which chute to toss the money down. Either keep withmaking the custom home brewed set that still needs a few other pieces with triple checking angles & measurements or gamble with what damage UPS or Fed Ex could do to the Flowmaster set. It would be cool saying I designed & engineered my own set. But with the summer ending with out an motor being broke in & loosing time to other more important matters being lazy might be better.

 

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Took the 45 deg to get flaired this afternoon & ended up with what I'm going to say is typical resaults but atleast the work was free. Had the shop cut it at spot for the first attempt so if things went bad I still had something to restart. Of course there are splits in the flair, they suggest welding them so it can have a good seal. Then their guy expanded the other end after they said they couldn't bring out to 2.5" with out spliting it, didn't even push it to 2.25" I.D. Best thing was with that was I didn't bring a flange to put on. But it was done in a spot I'll have to cut off anyways. I have been sitting here pondering just get the Flowmasters down pipes & start over, do have a discount code from Jegs (SAVENOW:$10 off $75+ orders, $20 off $150+ orders, $30 off $300+ orders). Really don't want to see if my "expert" welding skills are able to weld the flair cracks and make it have a good seal. Gotta remind myself why I didn't wan't another set of headers.

 

[CaliWagon83]

New York completely suxx in every possible way.

But if it's pre 96 and it has 4 wheels your good to go !!!

Yep that's a car, you can't fool me here is your sticker.

Better than Commiefornia. Anything post-‘75 requires a smog test! 😛