I've heard mix reviews about strait pipes some like it others hate. some hate it because they say it makes it sound like a *******'s truck. Is it worth spending the extra doe for the cat or should I get the off-road pipe???

Yes I know it's illegal but o well

If you vote for keeping the pipe give me a good cat and maby a price.

 

I love the sound of my 3" exhaust without a cat. Certainly doesn't sound like a truck and its quiet at idle. Gets loud when I take it above 3200 rpm, but its not annoying loud.

 

oh thats good

 

Keep it. Get a high-flow 3" model from Catco or Random Technologies. They *may* take away 1-2HP. I've heard people complain about getting headaches after they remove the cat because the exhaust fumes are higher.

 

Really? I've never heard about headaches.

 

if you can keep the car well tuned. you only need to pass a visual. just run a gutted cat.

 

i dont really car to much about gettin busted. i never get pulled over ,but i know i probablly will when i get it just for some rare occasion. I also heard thats bad for you because it creates back pressure. I hear things about people shuffing pipes thru them is that hard and is it true??

 

I would vote get RID of it, but don't just take an angle grinder and remove it and then shove a 3" pipe there. Do it right, with a couple of welds. No truck sound and no smell of exhaust. Just wish my friend would listen to me.

 

I'm not complaining... I have no cat, and my exhaust is roughly 1/2 the length of the stock exhaust. I'd say my car sounds closer to a Hemi 'Cuda than any truck, and the 350 is actually a very tame, 200hp mill

The cam thats in it has more to do with the 'truck sound' than just about anything else.

 

i was going through the same thing as you a month or two ago. i found a number of sound clips of systems w/o cats and they sounded very raspy...but not in a good way. i think it sounds crappy, almost like something's wrong with the exhaust.

my vote goes towards buying a cheap hi-flow cat. you can score one on ebay for $35 plus shipping, not bad at all. and it eliminates having to pay a shop to weld straight pipe in place of the cat (if you can even find a shop that does that).

anyway, just search around a little for sounds clips w/ and w/o cats and compare sounds. the performance gain of having straight pipe instead of a hi-flow cat is so minimal it shouldn't be a factor at all

examples:

GM 350/full exhaust/no cats - here
GM 350/full/exhaust w/ cats - here

i think at higher rpm's, having no cat makes the engine sound bad, but that's just my opinion

 

Based on my experience:

A simply gutted cat will actually be detremental to the performance and sound because the air gets VERY turbulent against the ribs on the inside of the chamber. This produces a lot of unneccesary heat and a strange popping/pinging noise in the exhaust.

Straight pipe reduces the heat buildup, straightens the airflow and removes the pinging noise all in one shot.

So, I took my cat and cut the exit flange off and welded it to a piece of thick wall straight pipe. Then I removed the original heat shield from the cat body, and cut the ends off the cat body in the right place to slip it over the pipe, and weld one of the ends to the pipe. The other end is stitch welded to allow air/moistrure to escape.

Then, because I do this to all of my cars, I painted it high-temp flat black, so that the exhaust pipe under the car is less visible.

 

I should put a little disclaimer though, the only reason I don't have one is because the old one when to junk and at the time it was cheaper to just have a straigt pipe put in. I don't think it has much of an effect on anything except emissions (in other words I don't personally think there is a big difference in sound or performance) and even then I shouldn't be an issue if your car is kept in tune. again this is just my opinion/disclaimer

 

Yup, gutted cat usually makes the sound worse. All a new cat is gonna do for the sound is act like a 2nd muffler.

I have almost no exhaust on my car... seriously... Its a Y-pipe, then a Cherry Bomb Turbo (thats a turbo-style muffler, not a glasspack) where the cat was, and then a side exit under the car right in front of the rear wheel.

I can tell you right now, this does NOT sound like a dump truck or anything like that. This thing seriously sounds like an old Chrysler hemi, only with a choppier sounding idle, but without the solid lifter 'ticking' sound. It sounds EVIL!!!

And I won't be getting any tickets for it either, because its actually not any louder than the factory exhaust untill the secondaries open up, then it sounds kinda like a Chrysler hemi with open headers

 

air_adam you need to get a sound clip of that exhaust, i'd like to hear it

 

Im thinking i might just get ride off the cat.

 

I REALLY want to, but I have no way to do it
I'm so proud of this exhaust, but I can't show it off here!!! BAHH!!!