Stright Pipes? cats? mufflers?

[Billy Toppless]

i wanna run headers to pipes that exit INFRONT of my rear tires

now can i run headers to mufflers to outputs and be fine? or do i need to to cats cuz its fuel injected and all the othe c2 senser stuff?

and what headers/mufflers would some1 recomend for something thats load but not too loud (no glasspacks) i was thinking of the Flowmaster Super 44's

any info would be great

thanks

i have a 1990 Ford Bronco

 

[bidibronco]

The O2 sensor should be in front of the cats wich means they aren't there for emissions, just to regulate the fuel/air mixture a little bit. On your driver side there isn't enough room to run a pipe unless you get a body lift or run it outside of the frame rail. You'll end up having to run them both on the passenger side for a little bit and then get one pipe to go to the driver side. I have a set up that takes the driver side pipe and runs it under the engine (just like stock) and eleminated the Y pipe and ran both pipes in an over/under type and my driver side pipe runs just under my output shaft of the t-case and ran it just so the pipes exit right infront of the rear tires. This is an older pic of when I lost some bolts in my drive shaft but you can see my exhaust as well. You can kind of see how they're dubled up on the passenger side and how it's ran under the t-case.



Hope it helps?

 

[Blue beast]

http://www.cherrybomb.com/products-front.asp Don't run what everyone else does be original!! Cutting cats off is a federal crime $1700.00 fine I

heard, B ut there are plenty of people out there running without them and I don't know anybody who has gotten pulled over and had a officer check

the cats!! If they are plugged you will get a power boost but don't expect much if they are fine and removed.

 

[bidibronco]

Sounds like someone is a "billboard" for cherrybomb?

 

[Billy Toppless]

The O2 sensor should be in front of the cats wich means they aren't there for emissions, just to regulate the fuel/air mixture a little bit. On your driver side there isn't enough room to run a pipe unless you get a body lift or run it outside of the frame rail. You'll end up having to run them both on the passenger side for a little bit and then get one pipe to go to the driver side. I have a set up that takes the driver side pipe and runs it under the engine (just like stock) and eleminated the Y pipe and ran both pipes in an over/under type and my driver side pipe runs just under my output shaft of the t-case and ran it just so the pipes exit right infront of the rear tires. This is an older pic of when I lost some bolts in my drive shaft but you can see my exhaust as well. You can kind of see how they're dubled up on the passenger side and how it's ran under the t-case. View attachment 5255

Hope it helps?

thats a good idea

i do plan on lifting it

how much was that to get installed?

 

[Blue beast]

I am just tired of everyone running the same mufflers and their trucks sounding the same!! Use something different and sound different same

goes for bori ng straight pipes get some glasspacks any brand at least, They are loud when you punch it and nice and mellow and deep while

cruising. use different length pipes or diameters or both to stop droning with straight or glas packs that is just annoying.

 

[green streak]

something else to think about is that if you dual it out before the rear tires, the exhaust is pure **** on aluminum wheels. i ruined 2 mickey thompson classic II rims on my old f-150 from exhaust exiting the pipes in front of the rear wheels, and hitting the wheels. it turned them a light shade of yellow and it wouldn't come off. of course, my truck was probably running pig rich at the time too, but that's just some food for thought for you. good luck.

 

[bidibronco]

Also, with the pipes running in front of the tires it's rather loud at highway speeds but I'm young and it doesn't bother me. The exhast came like that when I bought it but a guy I know said he would "redo" my pipes to exit at a 90* behind the tire for $300 and that would be all new pipes. As for the cherry bomb fellow, I happen to enjoy the sound of my boring ol' strait pipes. My tips used to be baffled but running rich and lean and rich and lean fixed that problem for me. I also do have two different sized pipes but they sound the same from either side. I understand some people don't like it but it's my truck and I do. Also, I don't like when people run around my area at 2am with their bass up and waking up my 2 year old so again, what goes around comes around. Not trying to be a **** but everyone is entitled to what THEY like....

 

[Billy Toppless]

Also, with the pipes running in front of the tires it's rather loud at highway speeds but I'm young and it doesn't bother me. The exhast came like that when I bought it but a guy I know said he would "redo" my pipes to exit at a 90* behind the tire for $300 and that would be all new pipes. As for the cherry bomb fellow, I happen to enjoy the sound of my boring ol' strait pipes. My tips used to be baffled but running rich and lean and rich and lean fixed that problem for me. I also do have two different sized pipes but they sound the same from either side. I understand some people don't like it but it's my truck and I do. Also, I don't like when people run around my area at 2am with their bass up and waking up my 2 year old so again, what goes around comes around. Not trying to be a **** but everyone is entitled to what THEY like....

alright well ill ask around and see wut it runs

and a nail strip infront of your house will fix the boom box proplem pronto

thanks alot

 

[Broncobill78]

I've run this setup a number of times. Both of my frame-off's were 460 conversions and my F350 came with one from Ford. I liked both the look & the sound of a short straight-pipe that kicks out just in front of the rear tire. I don't know what you're running but on all 3 of mine I ran fenderwell headers. It made the routing ridicuously easy, no screwing around with trying to squeeze past the Xfer case or any of that silly bull$hit. The entire exhaust run consisted of a collector, a 3ft straight pipe, a muffler & an elbow. Took all of 15 minutes to install. I ran a set of glasspacks the first time (I won't type the "C"-word but I think we all know what brand they were) but being so close to the header and with only a 3ft straight-pipe w/no bends to help quiet it down they were really, really loud, I mean they were "HEY, COME CHECK OUT MY $HIT, MEASURE MY LIFT & GIVE ME A TICKET" loud. So unless your brother-in-law is the Chief I'd leave those well enough alone & let the go-fast crowd ***** around with them. All I wound up running was a set of Brand-X turbos and they were plenty loud & mellow for me. I really liked the fenderwell headers (stainless from L&L) but you do have to watch them if you're running big rubber. They were ok with the 36's but the 38.5's would rub if I wasn't careful and I had a girlfriend who became an Ex right then & there and walked home after borrowing it to pickup a couch and carelessly melted a hole in a 2-month old 40" Radial TSL Super Swamper even after she had been explicitly told to be carefull not to do exactly what she did.

Unfortunately running something like that on a 90' will just freaking scream *illegal chopped-up exhaust* to the cop sitting in the cruiser next to you as your exhaust blows directly into his rolled-down window. That was the only other problem with a side kick-out exhaust like that on a big truck, after a while your conscience starts to nag at you & you feel bad when each & every person you come up next to at a traffic light rolls up their window in disgust and mouths dirty words at you. It's like I told my kids when they were younger, it's all well and good to like getting attention but there's good attention and bad attention. If you run a fenderwell exhaust then everything's right there for everyone to see so you'd better have your cats and anything else you need. Being a 90' I don't know if you need to run an air-tube to your cats but that will be one more thing to consider. As a final note, I just have to say that I *really* did like the way the whole package looked. A nice black undercoated fenderwell w/painted hardware, big red coil springs, dual white shocks w/red boots & shiney stainless headers w/a nice stainless exhaust running down right along the framerail & kicking out just in front of the rear tire. It really looked nice and the real bonus plan there was that since the exhaust was just a straight-pipe, muffler & an elbow it didn't cost very much to order the parts in stainless & bolt them on. I saved so much over paying someone to bend it up that I was able to order everything in stainless and still save a bundle over a custom job.

 

[bidibronco]

I ran a set of glasspacks the first time (I won't type the "C"-word but I think we all know what brand they were) but being so close to the header and with only a 3ft straight-pipe w/no bends to help quiet it down they were reall, really loud, I mean they were "HEY, COME CHECK OUT MY $HIT, MEASURE MY LIFT & GIVE ME A TICKET" loud.

) I LOVE IT!!! I actually went to an ATM in the Bronco right after a cop had pulled up so I got the wild hair in my behind to ask what is legal and not for exhaust. I reved the Bronco a time or two and he told me that as long as I'm not sitting at a light or in a parking lot just reving it up then I'll be fine. His exact words were "It's nothing like the Harley's around here so it's fine" and that summed it up for me. If a harley can out do your exhaust, you're good to go

 

[Broncobill78]

) I LOVE IT!!! I actually went to an ATM in the Bronco right after a cop had pulled up so I got the wild hair in my behind to ask what is legal and not for exhaust. I reved the Bronco a time or two and he told me that as long as I'm not sitting at a light or in a parking lot just reving it up then I'll be fine. His exact words were "It's nothing like the Harley's around here so it's fine" and that summed it up for me. If a harley can out do your exhaust, you're good to go

Well, you know that's actually a valid point. The two-wheel guys get away with it because when push comes to shove they're able to point to the fact that the muffler is D.O.T approved regardless of how loud it is. To some degree the same thing applies to our trucks. If everything that's supposed to be there is and all the parts you've used are either factory correct or DOT approved then it really doesn't matter how loud it is, it's legal. Back when I lived in New England there were beach-towns (Hampton Beach & places down on the Cape) where local Law Enforcement had a Zero-tollerance position on all that stuff & passed local by-laws stipulating just how loud a vehicle could be. These laws were catch-alls that didn't differentiate between stereo noise or exhaust & each crusier had decibel-meters that they used to check you out. Stereos were one thing & quite frankly I'm not very sympathetic to that whole crowd but the laws were frequently used to hassle guys with "loud" exhaust and to be honest, as a fomer police officer (12 yrs) I had a problem with this because it was just plain wrong. I had a friend cited for this up in Hampton Beach, NH and wound up going to court with him. We brought the reciepts for everything he'd installed and a notorized affidavit from the *dealership* mechanic who had installed them attesting to the fact that the reciepted parts were actually the ones installed on the truck as well as photos and the truck itself. Fortunately he still had the boxes everything came in and we were able to conclusively demonstrate to the Judge that all of the exhaust parts were 1) brand new & 2) DOT approved. The Judge looked everything over and dismissed the case in less than 5 minutes but it was a hassle to get everything together and we both took time off from work to go up to an out-of-state court. When I was younger we would use our free time in shop to open up a pair of turbo mufflers, cut everything out with a zip saw & grinder then weld them back up, they sounded great but it was an awful lot of work.

 

[Billy Toppless]

I've run this setup a number of times. Both of my frame-off's were 460 conversions and my F350 came with one from Ford. I liked both the look & the sound of a short straight-pipe that kicks out just in front of the rear tire. I don't know what you're running but on all 3 of mine I ran fenderwell headers. It made the routing ridicuously easy, no screwing around with trying to squeeze past the Xfer case or any of that silly bull$hit. The entire exhaust run consisted of a collector, a 3ft straight pipe, a muffler & an elbow. Took all of 15 minutes to install. I ran a set of glasspacks the first time (I won't type the "C"-word but I think we all know what brand they were) but being so close to the header and with only a 3ft straight-pipe w/no bends to help quiet it down they were reall, really loud, I mean they were "HEY, COME CHECK OUT MY $HIT, MEASURE MY LIFT & GIVE ME A TICKET" loud. So unless your brother-in-law is the Chief I'd leave those well enough alone & let the go-fast crowd ***** around with them. All I wound up running was a set of Brand-X turbos and they were plenty loud & mellow for me. I really liked the fenderwell headers (stainless from L&L) but you do have to watch them if you're running big rubber. They were ok with the 36's but the 38.5's would rub if I wasn't careful and I had a girlfriend who became an Ex right then & there and walked home after borrowing it to pickup a couch and carelessly melted a hole in a 2-month old 40" Radial TSL Super Swamper even after she had been explicitly told to be carefull not to do exactly what she did.
Unfortunately running something like that on a 90' will just freaking scream *illegal chopped-up exhaust* to the cop sitting in the cruiser next to you as your exhaust blows directly into his rolled-down window. That was the only other problem with a side kick-out exhaust like that on a big truck, after a while your conscience starts to nag at you & you feel bad when each & every person you come up next to at a traffic light rolls up their window in disgust and mouths dirty words at you. It's like I told my kids when they were younger, it's all well and good to like getting attention but there's good attention and bad attention. If you run a fenderwell exhaust then everything's right there for everyone to see so you'd better have your cats and anything else you need. Being a 90' I don't know if you need to run an air-tube to your cats but that will be one more thing to consider. As a final note, I just have to say that I *really* did like the way the whole package looked. A nice black undercoated fenderwell w/painted hardware, big red coil springs, dual white shocks w/red boots & shiney stainless headers w/a nice stainless exhaust running down right along the framerail & kicking out just in front of the rear tire. It really looked nice and the real bonus plan there was that since the exhaust was just a straight-pipe, muffler & an elbow it didn't cost very much to order the parts in stainless & bolt them on. I saved so much over paying someone to bend it up that I was able to order everything in stainless and still save a bundle over a custom job.

what website would i find all this stuff on?

my plan was to run headmans or hookers to Flowmaster super 44's (with cats if i need them) and then exit them dual style in front of my tires with one on each side

would this work? and if im running short pipes where am i gonna have room for cats? or can i say f@$# it and not even put them on?

 

[Broncobill78]

what website would i find all this stuff on?my plan was to run headmans or hookers to Flowmaster super 44's (with cats if i need them) and then exit them dual style in front of my tires with one on each side

would this work? and if im running short pipes where am i gonna have room for cats? or can i say f@$# it and not even put them on?

Ok, here's the rundown. The headers came from L&L (a first rate company that understands quality) and everything else came from JC Whitney. I'm not for sure on this but I'm fairly certain that the headers L&L sells are Doug Thorleys (but I seem to remember he sold his company & they jacked his name so when he went back to it and started selling headers again he couldn't use his name so now he sells his stuff as just "Doug's headers" ). Now before anyone goes rolling their eyes over JC Whitney I have to say that a 2.5" stainless exhaust pipe is a 2.5" stainless exhaust pipe regardless of who you're getting it from. I'll grant that a lot of what they peddle should be coming out of gumball machines at Wal-Mart but hidden in all the rubbish are some good quality parts that they sell pretty cheap. I ordered a pair of 3ft 2.25" stainless straightpipes, two 90* elbows, a pair of stainless trubo mufflers and stainless exhaust clamps & hangers. I also ran the same setup on a another Bronco but just used regular ole' carbon steel (same stainless headers though) and a set of Cherrybombs. My F350 was the same deal (carbon steel & glasspacks) but I needed a pair of 6ft straightpipes and switched out the Cherrybombs for turbo's a few months after installing it. The headers pretty much have to come from someone who makes & sells headers but you should be able to find everything else locally if you call around. Any muffler shop can sell you the straights & elbows and with a few phone calls you should be able to find someone who works with stainless and will sell you what you need & that will save you the shipping costs.

I'm not sure where you live but if you're up in the rustbelt then I would absolutely invest in the stainless. You'll be able to put it one once & forget about it. A carbon steel system will still rust out on you eventually but it should last longer than your average exhaust system because the headers and the fact that it's a short system with no real bends in it will keep it pretty dry (that's why "Y" pipes don't usually rot out, the heat from the engine evaporates any moisture in there) If you don't run cats there will be even less moisture in the system but either way the salt will eventually get the better of it and you'll have to replace it.

If you DO run cats then I'd put the **** for the O2 sensor in the collector and attach the cats to the collectors & run the rest of it back from there. Alternately you could also just clamp the cat to the upstream side of the muffler and do it that way. There aren't many specific rules that I'm aware of, you should try to have the cats up close to the engine because they need to reach a certain temp to work correctly so you don't want them too far back but with a system like this you should be ok with just about any placement between the collector & the muffler since the muffler is going to be so much closer to the engine than if you were running a stock setup. A lot of the cats I've seen have stainless shells *anyways* so you're in good shape there.

If you run standard headers you're going to be looking at a fair ammount of custom bending to get you where you want to be, not sure if that was the plan or the budget you had in mind but once you tuck the exhaust on the inside of the frame you start running out of space real quick. If you're looking to run it outside the frame make sure that whatever headers you look at are "Fenderwell exit" otherwise you'll get the inside the frame variety. I went with the fenderwell exit headers for two reasons, 1) it let me build & install the entire system myself without having to pay for someone to bend it the way I wanted and then for me to pay them to install it and 2) by moving the exhaust outside of the frame it really opened up a LOT of space. You don't realize just how often the exhaust gets in your way until it's gone. It was so much more convenient to not have to work around it, I really fell in love with that exhaust once it was on because it just made working on everything else inside the frame so much easier.

The headers came from L&L products in beautiful sunny Texas, here's their link:

http://www.landlproducts.com/

Here's JC Whitney:

http://www.jcwhitney.com/autoparts/Product...0012767/c-10614

 

[Billy Toppless]

Ok, here's the rundown. The headers came from L&L (a first rate company that understands quality) and everything else came from JC Whitney. I'm not for sure on this but I'm fairly certain that the headers L&L sells are Doug Thorleys (but I seem to remember he sold his company & they jacked his name so when he went back to it and started selling headers again he couldn't use his name so now he sells his stuff as just "Doug's" ). Now before anyone goes rolling their eyes over JC Whitney I have to say that a 2.5" stainless exhaust pipe is a 2.5" stainless exhaust pipe regardless of who you're getting it from. I'll grant that a lot of what they peddle should be coming out of gumball machines at Wal-Mart but hidden in all the rubbish are some good quality parts that they sell pretty cheap. I ordered a pair of 3ft 2.25" stainless straightpipes, two 90* elbows, a pair of stainless trubo mufflers and stainless exhaust clamps & hangers. I also ran the same setup on a another Bronco but just used regular ole' carbon steel (same stainless headers though) and a set of Cherrybombs. My F350 was the same deal (carbon steel & glasspacks) but I needed a pair of 6ft straightpipes and switched out the Cherrybombs for turbo's a few months after installing it. The headers pretty much have to come from someone who makes & sells headers but you should be able to find everything else locally if you call around. Any muffler shop can sell you the straights & elbows and with a few phone calls you should be able to find someone who works with stainless and will sell you what you need.
I'm now sure where you live but if you're up in the rustbelt then I would absolutely invest in the stainless. You'll be able to put it one once & forget about it. A carbon steel system will still rust out on you eventually but it should last longer than your average exhaust system because the headers and the fact that it's a short system with no real bends in it will keep it pretty dry (that's why "Y" pipes don't usually rot out, the heat from the engine evaporates any moisture in there) If you don't run cats there will be even less moisture in the system but either way the salt will eventually get the better of it and you'll have to replace it.

If you DO run cats then I'd put the **** for the O2 sensor in the collector and attach the cats to the collectors & run the rest of it back from there. Alternately you could also just clamp the cat to the upstream side of the muffler and do it that way. There aren't many specific rules that I'm aware of, you should try to have the cats up close to the engine because they need to reach a certain temp to work correctly so you don't want them too far back but with a system like this you should be ok with just about any placement between the collector & the muffler since the muffler is going to be so much closer to the engine than if you were running a stock setup. A lot of the cats I've seen have stainless shells *anyways* so you're in good shape there.

If you run standard headers you're going to be looking at a fair ammount of custom bending to get you where you want to be, not sure if that was the plan or the budget you had in mind but once you tuck the exhaust on the inside of the frame you start running out of space real quick. If you're looking to run it outside the frame make sure that whatever headers you look at are "Fenderwell exit" otherwise you'll get the inside the frame variety. I went with the fenderwell exit headers for two reasons, 1) it let me build & install the entire system myself without having to pay for someone to bend it the way I wanted and for them pay them to install it and 2) by moving the exhaust outside of the frame it really opened up a LOT of space. You don't realize just how often the exhaust gets in your way until it's gone. It was so much more convenient to not have to work around it.

The headers came from L&L products in beautiful sunny Texas, here's their link:

http://www.landlproducts.com/

Here's JC Whitney:

http://www.jcwhitney.com/autoparts/Product...0012767/c-10614

wow thank you so much

 

[bluefordcat]

want a different look & sound run laker pipes on it!

 

[Broncobill78]

want a different look & sound run laker pipes on it!

Lake pipes on a Bronco ?!? Yup, sure would be different. For that matter why not stacks or zoomies ?

 

[Justshootme84]

Wow, Broncobill, that's some good info on the exhaust!!! I already test fit some L&L headers taht a friend has, and was trying to figure out what to run past them. I used to have an 85 Chevy 4x4 with a 350V8, headers, straight pipes thru dual glasspacks and no cats. It was so loud you could hear it on the other side of the bay 3 miles away. While I never got cited for it, the local Barney has given out tickets for "excessive noise' to others. For a trail only rig, I don't run cats, but i do on all street rigs that get inspected. if it has any rumble, the station will check for at least the presence of one or two cats underneath. JSM84

 

[Broncobill78]

Wow, Broncobill, that's some good info on the exhaust!!! I already test fit some L&L headers taht a friend has, and was trying to figure out what to run past them. I used to have an 85 Chevy 4x4 with a 350V8, headers, straight pipes thru dual glasspacks and no cats. It was so loud you could hear it on the other side of the bay 3 miles away. While I never got cited for it, the local Barney has given out tickets for "excessive noise' to others. For a trail only rig, I don't run cats, but i do on all street rigs that get inspected. if it has any rumble, the station will check for at least the presence of one or two cats underneath. JSM84

Well, I don't know what the deal is in Tx ( spent a couple years in Sabine Pass when I was diving for Oceaneering but never brought my rig down ) but most of the trucks I built were in the NorthEast and had to be inspected there, I'm in S.Fla now and this has *got* to be the MOST vehicle friendly state I've ever been in, it's run-whatcha-brung and they just don't seem to care as long as you pay for your tags. I've been tooling around in this 88' full of bullet holes (one right thru the windshield) and I haven't gotten so much as a second look. Did I mention that I blew out first and have been driving to Wal-Mart & back in reverse (done it 4x so far, knock on wood) for a week now ? I hate to look a gift horse in the mouth but they just don't seem to care.

As far as the exhaust, I'll admit I had to send the headers back to L&L once to have the flanges reground because even after notching my passenger side frame mount the collector ****** was knocking against it at idle & driving me nuts (I just HAD to have that big cam) but you just can't beat a set of thick-wall stainless headers and the fenderwell exit was really the way to go. It may not be for everyone because (especially with a late model road truck) you're hanging it all out for Joe-Public to see so if it came with a cat you need to pony-up and buy a couple as well as running that damn air-tube but with a 78/79 it was really the way to go. If you're playing with a set then you know what I mean about how nice it is to get all that exhaust out from inside the frame. working on a lifted rig with exhaust running outside the frame is just a wet-dream, there's nothing better.

To be perfectly honest, with the Hi-flow cats available today I really would run them. People aren't talking $hit about what we pump into the air and I honestly believe it's downright irresponsible to take them off a street truck. Running them DOESN'T cost a single HP (not these days), you need *some* backpressure anyways and why give the rest of America a reason to blame off-roaders and car/truck enthusiasts for the problems we're ALL facing ? I do my part & **** it up and run them when I should. Just my $.02.

Having said that, yeah those glasspacks sure are loud aren't they /emoticons/[email protected] 2x" width="20" height="20" /> I had the Harley guys throwing beer bottles at me when I came home a 3am (didn't feel too bad about them tho, you live by the sword you die by the sword) They were fun to run when I was a kid but once I had a few of my own those Turbos seemed like a good enuf compromise (NOBODY thinks you're running a six) & there's really no need to wake up the neighborhood & let the wife know that Last Call was an hour ago. I really can't say for sure but I ran them on my F-350 and it sure seemed like that damn bed acted like some sort of resonator because that's when I switched over to the turbo's. Fun is fun but it gets old feeling like you've just left an AC/DC concert every time you shut down your rig (do the kids here even know who they are ?) & when I switched over to turbo's I noticed that the neighbors stopped leaving flaming bags of dog-$hit on my doorstep, so there was that as well.