Initially when we bought the car, we thought it sounded great. A little on the "Ricer" side but powerful. After doing some other modifications to the car, I noticed that the muffler had a hole in it. It had just rusted right through. Now we know the cause of that distinctive "Ricer" sound.
After some thought and a lot of research I decided to replace the exhaust system starting at the Y-pipe and going back to the tail pipe. I decided to go with MSA's Super Turbo 2.5" exhaust.
The kit included all necessary aluminized pipes, clamps, hangers, muffler and large chrome tip (very cool looking). After only 5 days from the time I placed the order, it arrived at my doorstep.
Now I needed to recruit some help! Fred, another club member and a great friend of mine, had his arm twisted and finally said "Uncle" to my request for help. Actually it wasn't a twisting of the arm but the promise of baked goods from my girlfriend that brought him around!
In order to get under the car we used ramps, since we both live in townhouses. Please be very careful when using these. We placed wheel chocks under the front tires to prevent the car from rolling off the ramps and we set the car in reverse gear and initiated the hand break. We then proceeded to remove the old rusty, and let me stress rusty, muffler and pipe.
First we removed or loosened the old clamps that kept the muffler and pipes suspended. Then we proceeded to disconnect old assembly from the Y-pipe. Remember, I was only replacing the parts from the Y-pipe back. The joint was rusted up. After years of heat and corrosion, the two had bonded together. That's where an electric cutter came in handy. Always good to have a friend with power tools! Since the Y-pipe was inserted into the pipe that we were trying to remove, we knew that we could cut this pipe without damaging the Y-pipe.
Fred proceeded to cut a slot into the pipe deep enough to make the pipe break upon any kind of side-to-side or up-and-down movement. We wiggled the muffler along with the pipe until it broke, raining rust and debris all over us. But it finally disconnected from the Y-pipe.
So we finally removed the muffler. Now this muffler was rusted so badly in the inside that it sounded like a huge baby rattle when we shook it. No wonder the neighbors would stare at us when we started her up! And we thought it was out of envy!
After much munching on some homemade soft pretzels, we started installing the new exhaust. Like most projects, it proved to be not as simple as we initially thought. We learned that the pipes supplied in the kit did not fit very well. One problem was that the Y-pipe was longer than expected, thus making us eliminate the short pipe from the kit. Now we had to deal with the long pipe, the S pipe (it goes from the muffler under the rear axle), and the muffler.
We started connecting and adjusting the S-pipe to the muffler. After successfully doing that, we suspended our assembly under the car using new hangers. Now we had to install just the pipe missing from the Y-pipe to the S-pipe. Doing this way allowed us to place the long pipe in between and see how well (fingers crossed) it would fit. Since we eliminated the short pipe from the kit we used the long pipe to fill the gap. We quickly learned that the bends in the long pipe did not allow us to position the pipe correctly without touching the car's undercarriage. No matter how we tried, it would not fit. Either it touched the undercarriage or we could not get the Y-pipe and S-pipe connected. To our chagrin we learned that the bends had to be in a certain location so that the pipe would not touch the undercarriage.
Since we had the ordinal short straight pipe lying around, we made the decision to cut the long pipe. Yes, there was a reason for MSA including the short pipe in the kit! After measuring where it should be cut, we used the electrical cutter to accomplish the task.
Now we proceeded to connect all our pieces - the cut long pipe, the short pipe, the S-pipe and the muffler. It was tight but it fit without touching the undercarriage.
Next step was to attach the clamps on the joints. But we soon discovered that the clamp on the joint between the long-used-to-be-pipe and the short pipe was again touching the car's undercarriage. At this point there were no pretzels left and nothing else we could do about the touching. We finished hanging the exhaust system.
For the few short periods that I drove the car after the installation, I could hear the clamp hitting the undercarriage. So I took the car to the local muffler shop to have the joint MIG welded. One tip: if you have to do the same - do not wait too long. Have it welded while the pipe is in new condition, otherwise, the shop may refuse to weld it or it may not weld correctly.
Now that everything is taken care of, no undercarriage rattle and no hole in the muffler, my first impressions? Love it! The sound is nice - it is deeper, throatier, but not too loud either. Under normal driving I am not aware of the exhaust sound. However, once I hit accelerator, it opens up and lets everyone around you hear - THE Z IS COMING!
Giedrius and Fred
