Leland Pate

I went back at it again tonight, with a new vision and air tools handy.
It seemed there were a couple of options as far as how to modify the guts of the muffler. In the end, I decided it was worth a try to create a by-pass pipe between the inlet and outlets. $7.50 in galvanized pipe from Ace Hardware and off I went.

Pics are posted below.

All in all, I am very happy with the result. The car has that throaty growl that I have wanted so badly. At idle, you can just barely tell something is different. It burbles and has a more pronounced throatiness to it. When you get on the gas it really comes alive. Not in a drastic way; I don't think it is anywhere near as loud as supercups, but man it sounds good.
I can take a video clip if someone wants to host it. I feel very victorious at the moment. When I modified the guts last time it made almost no difference at all. Now the car sounds like it means business.

This was very easy to do. I bought two feet of 1 1/2" pipe, eyeballed it and started cutting the ends to match the inlet and outlet pipes. This was the most tedious part as it was a lot of trial and error before I got an acceptable fit. Once that was done I marked the pipes and cut the holes. Then the bypass pipe was welded together and painted with silver hi-temp to try and protect the weld (I ain't no fancy stainless Tig welder, just yet). Speaking of welds, you all can make fun of my poor beads, but I couldn't care less. I didn't do this for the bling factor and I know my skills lack finesse. Only other thing that had to be modified was the heat shield. You can see I made a cutout for it to fit around the new bypass pipe.

This would have been much easier if I had the proper tools (plasma cutter). As it was, I had to slowly use my cutoff tool with an air compressor that can hardly keep up. But I managed.

Let me know if you all would like and further information.

And I'm going to paste this into the Muffler suggestions needed thread for the sake of the archives.

Cheers,

DJF1

Very cool! Congrats!!! I look forward to the video/audio!

Scott 1996 993c2

Wow, nice accomplishment. Thanks for sharing your experience.

Scott

nman413

Ghetto. I like it

graham_mitchell

I like your spirit! Couldn't you have joined the inlet and outlet on the inside instead to keep the factory look, and prevent having to change the heat shield?

What internal mods did you try which were unsuccessful?

SKM

Good result, congrats. The factory motorsound mufflers also have a 1 1/2" cross-pipe however it is inside the muffler and replaces the more narrow (1"?) cross-over pipe of the base muffler.

grmnxtc

Leland sent me two video clips to host.

I've setup the one that I think gives a better sound impression. They're great! Subtle, yet throaty and growly!!

Here you go folks.

http://manmicro.com/porsche/muffler/new_mufflers.MOV

Enjoy!

Clive.

Leland Pate

Thanks for hosting it, Clive. I hope it is on par with everyone's expectations.

Graham, I could have installed the pipe inside the can. I opted not to because of the hours it would have taken me to re-open them with my piddly 8 gal. air compressor. Plus, it is a royal PITA to get them apart. You will break a sweat! If I were starting all over, with the right tools, I would just remove all the packing, cut out the original by-pass pipe and install the new, larger version and put it back together.

This was just a BETA for us all to learn from.

My original modifications was to remove the steel wool from the perferated sections of the internal pipe and support and cut off the end cap of the inlet pipe. Hardly any noticable change in sound.

Alan C.

If you decide to do any more work on the mufflers you might want to use a stainless cross over pipe. That coated carbon pipe won't last near as long as the rest of the system. It will fail in the weld, nothing to do with your weld quality.

GREAT sound !

aof

Sounds great! Impressive work!!

Does it pop on deceleration?

Leland Pate

It does give that "burble" on deceleration, but I have not heard a loud, obnoxious, "pop."
I know the pipe wil eventually rust. I bought another set of gillete mufflers from a guy on Pelican, so these were just a test set. Glad you liked the sound; I know I do.

mr_bock

Cool sound! Good to think outside of the box and try new ideas. The second try is always better than the first (as in prototype). Very good results.

Nikoncamera

Ive just finished doing this mod Leland... and your are 100% right, its excellent!
Cost me $100, to get it done in stainless, 1 1/2 inch pipe. Painted it matt black (high temp paint) and you have to look real hard to see it.
Sounds great... a little more deepness at idle, seriously cool flat six ripping scream at high revs, and terrific rough burble on deceleration!
Quiet enough at low to moderate revs that the wife wont suspect a thing!
Thanks mate for a really cheap, effective exhaust mod, cheers Lyndon

Leland Pate

Lyndon, so glad I acurately described the modification. Also, if you get a chance I'd love for you to post a few pics of your professionally welded pipes.

Caveman

Are any of the guys that were posting a while back on this subject going to update us with their work to date? There is a muffler shop near me that offers to build mufflers to fit any car at a fixed price. I am tempted to see what they can do...

Cheers,

David