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Not sure how i want to do my exhaust...

crackerican69

Veteran CEG'er
Joined
Apr 27, 2011
Messages
553
Location
Gilbertsville, PA
So I'm getting ever closer to finishing up my center exhaust bumper and that means I'll be starting the exhuast itself soon after. I've been debating about true duals for a while now but im still not sure. If I do go that route, what would be a good size pipe to run? Was thinking 2-2.25. If not, with/without main cat, with/without resonator, and what would be a better muffler/no muffler? I want a nice deep, almost V8 rumble and not excessively loud.
 
I think your biggest issues here are going to be packaging and heat management from the exhaust system into the body, as well as possibly modifying body sheet metal to accommodate a relocated rear muffler.

FWIW, years ago, we went through the dual exhaust debate with the V6 Taurus SHO, and over near 20 years, nobody ever demonstrated a performance improvement that was worth the hassle of trying to run two pipes down the tunnel and around the fuel tank, the Contour has similar pipe routing, and it required two forward resonators or the dual exhaust was a loud, buzzy, raspy mess.

Your desires for not excessively loud and nice rumble mean a forward center resonator and as large as possible, high-quality mufflers.

With all the issues of getting pipe around the fuel tank, I believe I'd opt for one 2.5" pipe. Done right (assembled with mandrel bends, not crush bent at a muffler shop), this will easily support a 300HP engine.

I suspect there isn't much room for a centered rear muffler unless you flatten the trunk spare tire well. At a minimum, you'll need to relocate the fuel vapor recovery canister to keep it away from exhaust heat, and I'd recommend a muffler heat shield to protect the trunk contents.

If this were me doing this, I'd opt for stock piping configuration with a split behind the fuel tank as is now, use two high-quality short case mufflers either side of the spare tire well and some mandrel bends to bring the muffler outlets inboard to a pair of center exits, but that's just me. I wouldn't be willing to hack up the body sheet metal for the tiny gains you get from screwing with the exhaust configuration. A set of good tubular headers up front will give you more gains for less effort and Dollars than all the fancy exhaust plumbing you can imagine out back.
 
Thank you for the insight! I like the sound i have now (stock pre-cats, gutted main, stock resonator and cut pipe under the rear subframe (no mufflers)). I have the piece i did cut off and was going to use that as a base for the bends in the rear. I thought about cutting the spare well out and putting in a flat piece of metal in its place for the smog/fuel mount but keep it in its stock location with a heat shield. But my plan right now is to keep it all in tact and run the piping around the basin and out the bumper. I got smaller length tips for that reason.
 
I think I'd like to do my exhaust like yours, but keep my main cat intact. Can you describe how loud it is, on a level of 1-10 with 1 being stock? Or post a sound clip?
 
For sure, thanks man. I did my exhaust the same way, but kept my cat intact because of Colorados emission testing. Still sounds good, just wish it was a bit louder. I think I'll eventually go with a magnaflow resonator.
 
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