How to make your truck/vehicle sound beastly! for $30 (exhaust/muffler)

This instructable will explain in depth how to rework your exhaust system to make it purr/roar/growl (which ever description you like)

NOTE ABOUT THE VIDEO, AND I WANT TO PUT THIS NOTE RIGHT HERE TO MAKE SURE EVERYONE SEES THIS NOTE..... THE FIRST PART OF THE RECORDING, THE CAMERA WAS REALLY CLOSE TO THE ENGINE, SO THE CAMERA PICKED UP THOSE SOUNDS.... I HAD NO IDEA BECAUSE WHEN I WAS THERE WHERE THE CAMERA WAS, IT SOUNDED FINE.... AND THEN THE SECOND PART WHEN I DIDTHE CAMERA ADJUSTMENT, WAS DOWN THE SIDE.... NOT RIGHT BY THE MUFFLER, BUT ON THE SIDE NEED THE PASSENGER DOOR KINDA.... BUT IM REALLY HAPPY WITH IT... ILL GET SOME MORE SOUNDS UP IF THIS GET POSITIVE FEEDBACK.... OR IF ANYONE REQUESTS IT........ HOPE YOU LIKE......AND I SWEAR TO GOD IT WAS BECAUSE OF THE HILL!!!

id also like to say that if there is another instructable about this...(yes i did search) then ill delete mine..... unless mine is totally better

First off I'd like to appologize for no pictures. I know even after i appologize for this people are still going to complain. but ive already done this to my truck, i didnt think about instructables because time was against me (needed my truck up and running to go to school tommorow) but again sorry for no pictures, cuz there is no way im putting it back the old way so i can show pictures..... if i ever do this to another vehicle ill be sure to take pictures.

but due to the lack of pictures i will try to detail as much as possible.
also I'll try to get around to getting audio up of what my truck sounds like (ok i have the sound now.... sorry sound quality is bad.... and also i wish i had a before recording of it :( )

basically we're going to remove the muffler (NOT THE CATALYTIC CONVERTER!, thats illegal)

oh one more thing, this instructable is designed for those who are lucky enough (or in some others opinion, unlucky) to have clamps that hold their pipes together {see 2nd picture}

i repeat: pipes are not welded together. pipes ARE held together with clamps...... note* the way its held together (weld/clamp) only matters for the two connections on the muffler.

Step 1 Aquire Tools

You will definatly need an adjustable wrench

it is recommended to use a ratchet/socket wrench ? see photo, im bad with tool names
have an assortment of fittings, i used 4 types 10 mm, 13mm, 14mm, and 15mm. (fricken metric system)

if you dont use a ratchet/socket wrench then you'll need 2 adjustable wrenches

possibly (and in my case) a compressor and a die grinder. if you dont have either of those.... youll need a hand saw or whatever kinda saw you can find that will work, and alot of patience.

possibly a flat headscrew driver and a hammer

Comments

[General Lee]

will cutting the exhaust right after the muffler make my truck louder? i have a 1994 dakota v6 and its already kinda loud and i was wondering if it would work and will it make it perform better?

[2 stroke]

our schools race car does not have a catalist and it runs better without it i dont know why

[spcolsson]

that's because everything in the exhaust system creates more back pressure now some back pressure is good to an extent but beyond that u start loosing power most cars produced now a days have such a restrictive exhaust that u could easily see 10 - 20% in cress in power if u ran pipes from the header straight out the back of the car

[2 stroke]

i love strait pipes thanks for the reply

[HAL 9000]

Hmm, all these loud mufflers are getting a little old. When i hear one i don't think "wow, that guys car is probably pretty bad-ass," i think "Wow, that guy just put a $20 muffler tip on his truck or car." Heres a secret, that coffee-can/fart-pipe muffler is not nearly as impressive as you think. take your money and make your car *actually* run better.

I'm going to give $10 to the first person to make an instructable about modifying your muffler to make your engine completely silent. That, i think, would be cool.

[CrashANBurn]

could probably kill blind people because they dont hear your car its like getting hit by a prius but bigger still hurts tho

[rmartinez-1]

That would be amazing, but I think Rolls Royce has the market cornered. lol Plus, it'd probably rob power. :(

[starg8man]

I have actually scene a car who's exhaust was modified to nearly silent.
I believe that had a walker exhaust Quiet-FlowSS Muffler something in the 20000 series, I dont have the exact model number, but they had dual mounted these mufflers, with what appeared to be steel pipe about a quarter inch thick welded to the exit pipe, on the end of that was a reverse conical header. Their car was very quite, and i imagine it had no trouble passing smog what so ever.

[Yerboogieman]

(Old comment I know, sorry) My friends car has over 500 horsepower with the dyno to prove it. The exhaust is a bit annoying, but people still think it's a ricer car. Rotary engines!

[spcolsson]

rx-7 for the win!!!!!!! i miss mine

[The_Beast]

Same here, I like the deep sound on a truck or sport coupe but not on anything else (Honda or any kinda import) I don't even look anymore :(

[candle360]

haha, my camaro has the muscle to back up that beastly rumble, I love pulling up to a little riced out honda and revving it up, he revs back and when the light goes green all he sees is tire smoke and I see him in the rear view, and hear that little engine revving so hard it's probably going to give

[buddton]

Just putting my opinion in here. your "beastly Camaro" probably isn't all that. I'm not saying that Honda's are the bomb. I'm just honestly stating the fact that your "beast" can lose to a foreign car. Don't let your head swell up too much because you have a two ton car that runs 12's on the quarter mile stock. <--- If driven too it's full potential of course.

[candle360]

Well my car was sold in December of 09. It actually did run 12s lol. But I am at a much higher elevation than sea level, about 4400 above, if I'm not mistaken. It wasn't stock though. I had to do a few things to get it to run 12s. Anyway, yup, it's gone and I want another one.. =(

[yo man]

what do yo drive

[gunguru94]

i took every thing behind the header pipes off : )

[gunguru94]

you could gut out the cat and put it back on so the garage would not notice then put on some glass packs: }

[candle360]

haha, nice. my truck has glass packs. my camaro's getting one glass pack, it has a y-pipe so it only gets one =( later I'll build a completely custom exhaust with full length headers, dual cats, and dual glass packs

[heheheha]

I find the idea that backpressure as a good thing humorous...do you actually know what back pressure is and it's use? Back pressure whorks against the valves in an engine, thereby worknig your engine harder. Back pressure is not agood thing generally speaking. However Back pressure is used in the scavenging effect of RACE motors, as street motors are very rarely tuned in sch a way as to use scavenging to any large effect. Back pressure good for cars? Ha

[Thelonelysandwitch]

mufflers create allot of back pressure which holds back power. it is best without a muffler.

[bridge7605]

I beg to differ heheheha, back pressure in almost all unmodified little four bangers, is a necessity, but only on non-modified, (performance enhanced) four-cylinder engines. In fact, I'm sure there are quite a few people associated with instructables, whom own four-cylinder vehicles, and can back up my claim after having a leaking exhaust system repaired, and they've noticed an increase in power, (and/or performance) after the repairs. However this is only true for little four-cylinder engines, which have never had any performance enhancements done to them! From my well-trained ear, (I was a certified Master mechanic for a number of years) I would say that this guy should have spent his money on a throw out, or release bearing, (from the sound of the noise I heard prior to relocating the camera) not to mention a tuneup! But hey, give the guy credit because his intentions were noble even though to most of us his efforts were more of an annoyance to our ears.

[eight]

heheheha
RE: I find the idea that backpressure as a good thing humorous...
And
RE: Back pressure good for cars? Ha

Unless of course you happen to be taking about a Two Stroke engine.

Detroit Diesel 2 strokes use this principle.

What I did not know was that Racing Engines use the principle.
I guess you must be talking with fuel injection...

BTW, Nice idea for a post.
Wallpaper... Um... No.
The slits... I have no idea what that was - made no sense.

[bridge7605]

Eight, The slits he was talking about were necessary in order to remove the muffler from the exhaust pipe due to the muffler clamps deforming the flange of the muffler where it attaches to the exhaust pipe. Evidently, he didn't have a set of oxygen acetylene torches to heat up the area where the muffler clamp deformed the metal the flange of the muffler. Therefore in order to separate the pieces he had to use a die grinder, (or what ever he had at his disposal) to cut a slit in the muffler flange, (parallel to the exhaust pipe) so he could pry the flange of the muffler open in order to separate it from the exhaust pipe. Hopefully, this helps to clear up what he was trying to explain.

[eight]

It did indeed. Thank You.

[Catbed]

a little back pressure is good because it keeps the valves from moving too freely and wearing out faster since it pushes against the valves.

[gunguru94]

yeah ok um valves don't need back presser to help close them they have springs noob..

[heheheha]

Two words: Valve springs:)

[heheheha]

On top of that... Valve springs close valves, cams open them. If you need backpressure to get your valves to work your car is probably not running. Not being free float devices, valves movement comes from mechanical parts (well, USUALLY). There fore backpressure works against the valves which works against the mechanicals which operate them

[2.3turbostang]

must be a chebby guy, that or you drive a civic.

stfu you dont know enough about cars and engines to talk about backpressure. turbo+backpressure= not good
BUT! n/a+backpressure= better fuel burn and mpg(stock cars)

n/a+backpressure=better burn(= more hp) faster revving....

please go away you car guy noob

[Thelonelysandwitch]

just pop holes in the muffler, many many holes.

[Dr.Paj]

That picture of your desktops wallpaper was a little...odd...but back to business. To get a decent sound get a good quality muffler some new headers for a nice deep but not extremely loud sound. The sound also depends on what type of muffler you get. Some starting mufflers are at around 50 bucks and up. Just another idea.

[sunspun]

QUOTING EARLIER COMMENT by ROTOROct 18, 2006. 11:53 PMrotorsays: or you could do what I do and wait for 10 years and allow a baseball-sized hole to rust through your muffler, giving it that rich, full-bodied sound that satisfies that deep-down body thirst. Jan 18, 2008. 3:55 PMsunspunsays: HAH! rotor says you can get the same effect "by accident", if your muffler happens to develop a hole in it from rust. That's exactly the approach I took, rotor - or rather, the approach my car took. It's been at least a year since I first noticed something... different... about how my car sounded all of a sudden. Just got awful loud for some reason; I was embarrassed at first, mainly when idling in traffic. I thought the muffler must've fallen off, so I asked someone to look under my car, and he said "There's a hole in your muffler!" I'm perpetually broke so never have done anything about fixing it. Apparently, though, that doesn't make it run worse or anything - just makes it louder, which, after I got used to it, I decided I like it better this way (most of the time). Makes my 92 Beretta (I'm the original owner) almost cool! (Or so I like to think at least) ;-) THANKS FOR POSTING THIS sunspun

[JordanZed]

It's not illegal around here (Toronto) I don't think. Everyone does this to their little tin can Civics and Integras. But this doesn't make your car sound more powerful, it just makes it loud. Remember, power is in the engine, not the muffler. Speaking of mufflers, aren't they supposed to muffle the sound? In which case this makes literally no sense.

[thinkdunson]

yes it literally does make sense. he wanted a meatier sound so he removed the muffler. what is it that you don't get?

[JordanZed]

I'm aware of his intentions, I just don't... agree with them. But, to each his own I guess.

[Jesus10555]

this instructable is taking the muffler off.

[JoshuaB86]

I believe that little tooly thing you have there is a ratcheting socket wrench... so you were basically mostly pretty right.

[DrStoooopid]

No offense.... ...nobody cares about your computer's desktop. What we DO care about is the information you're teaching us. How's about pictures that are more in-line with what you're doing. That would be more helpful than pictures of your desktop. Not trying to be mean, but if you're going to attach photos, make them relevant to the instructable, not your personal workspace.

[killerjackalope]

hey I have a good wee project you'd like I'm in the process of creating a new air filter box for my mum's car cos the standard stock filter/box combo makes it a bit breathless and the turbo's on it's way out so this seemed like a great plan to suck a little extra air in... I know a scrap-man who ends up with a million and one air filters including many K&N etc so I dug up the best conical filter I could get for fitting onto the intake directly and have just to get a section of pipe to fit around it and get sealed on then it has to cone inwards to where the other intake pipe which would have gone into the airbox cost so far: £0.50 Gave fifty pence for the filter

[TCPMeta]

Sounds like crap really. You just did a standard straight pipe job. Sounds like your truck is a 4 banger or a low end V6. If you live in a state that doesn't have emissions and you can get away with a straight pipe might as well take out the cat too. Who will know unless you take it to a shop and they lift the car or find out why you have a engine code for a missing cat.