I was walking through the parking lot at my school and I heard a car start up. It sounded real nice, like an old muscle car. As it idled, it had a nice bassy rumble, but the rumble was nicely complimented with mid-range and higher pitched, sort of "tingy" sound. It's hard to explain with words, but I'm sure you know the sound I am talking about. It sounded mean. I looked over expecting to see a sixty-something El Camino or something from that era, but no, it was an LT1 4th gen Trans Am. I did not get a chance to ask the guy what he had. What can I do do my car to duplicate that sound? I'm trying to avoid the over-used bassy rumble that you hear on most new Silverados and Tahoes these days. It seems like everybody has it, and the 4th gen Trans Am I heard today was a sound I dont often hear, and when I do its usually coming from an old Chevelle, Nova, etc etc. Is it just a particular cat back or muffler that makes that sound, or are unique engine specifications responsible?

 

i know it doesn't answer ur question but what color was the T/A i live in concord as well and probaly have seen it.

 

It was a White/Blue stripe 1994 25th Anniversary Trans Am. I'm pretty sure it used to be owned by a former TGO member.

 

LTs, no cats and some type of good muffler, could be a chambered muffler a bullet or somehtign like hooker, my friend has a lt1 TA with LT's ORY and dynomax bullet, i love the sound, heres a vid, kinda hard to hear but it gets the point http://video.projectcamaro.com/Playe...5-8102F919114B

 

LTs are out of the question, but I can get away with a dummy cat and any muffler. My plans are to have Hooker 2055s, gutted cat, and a Hooker cat back. Would this do the trick?

 

Do you just so happen to have the Hooker 2055s? If i am not mistaken i remember that being kinda pricey. Just being a voice of reason here but $700+ seems a bit ambitious to achieve a sexy sound. You have a work in progress, right? is that all you have left to do?

 

The sound you're describing that you heard on that LT1 can only come from one exhaust system. I have it on my forth gen LT1 and will soon be getting it for my 3rd gen L98 as well.


Borla. There is no substitute

 

I dont think they're $700+, but I'll have to check. Also, I currently have L03 manifolds and Y Pipe on a 350 - so I think it goes without saying that I'm DEFINITELY not spending money on headers just to achieve a sexy sound. But thats not really the whole point of this thread.

Then how is it that all those old cars I hear have the sound? I highly doubt they all have Borlas.

 

If you want to get that 60's "muscle car" sound out of a late model Fbody, it's not going to happen with a Flowmaster, Dynomax, Hooker or any of the other dime-a-dozen exhaust systems that are so common on late-model Camaro's/Firebirds. If you could get that very same sound your describing from any of those, then EVERY 3rd and 4th gen would sound exactly the way you described now wouldn't they? But they don't.

I'm running LT's, (no cat) and a Borla (running through an open plate) on my LT1 and it sound's exactly they way you described. Borla has a sound all it's own. Completely different than every other exhaust available for our cars and it's the closest thing to getting that old-school muscle car sound on these cars short of doing a custom duel exhaust yourself. (Perhaps that was what the guy was running?)

The reason why you don't hear too many 4th gen's sounding like old school muscle car's is because not too many them run Borla's

Do a search for Borla sound clips for 4th gen LT1's . You'll understand what I'm talking about....

 

You are referring to urbanhunter44's former car. PM him and i'm sure he'll tell you about the exhaust setup he had on that car...

 

Yeah, but I'm pretty sure it was different then. I drove his car before he sold it and I dont remember it sounding like that. I still plan on talking to him though.

LT1FUN - Do I have to spend a G on the entire Borla catback? Or can I take my pic from this list?

 

There are only two 25th's in Concord that are modded. Mine, which had a bullet muffler, and another one with a 383 stroker and a dumped true duals with bullet mufflers. That sounds like what you're talking about. What did the plates say? Mine said SLOW TA, has blue PONTIAC fillers on the back, and has blue birds on the side panels, as well as a door molding delete. If it didn't have the stickers, then it's got to be the other one.

My car didn't have a cat when you drove it, when I sold it to the guy I put a cat on it and he hasn't removed it. It might have been it.

My current car just has dumped long tubes How are my big block injectors working for your TBI?

 

These are Flowmasters on a 305 in a Van (actually it was on the dyno, but it had the same setup in the van), do they count.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=6XLXwAXkDHo

This is with dual flowmaster 50 Series Delta Flows.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=bSY4IwEJU6c

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JwWio6o9NHQ

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c4CY3PvklvM

 

Tony, i'm pretty sure I saw the blue bird stickers, but i've checked out the liscence plates and they FOR SURE do not say SLOW TA. I'll see it again, I can check it out and try to talk to him. The BBC injectors are working fantastic. Its been quite a learning experience re-writing the prom for them, but It's been super fun and I'll be able to get so much more out of my motor because of them. But I've still got that full 454 TBI unit hanging around. I dismantled it, cleaned it up good, and I am about to rebuild it. I'd like to throw it on, but there is no mount for the TV cable. (I guess the burb had a three speed?) I'm gonna try fabbing something up. I'm sure its been done before.

 

LT1FUN - What muffler from that list is like the one that came with your catback?

 

I don't think any of them are the same. The Borla catback for 3rd and 4th gens have a Y built into them after they come over the axle, and one side runs through the muffler and then through the tip on the driver's side, the other side of the y runs straight out of a tip on the passenger side. There are a series of plates that you can use after the y to restrict exhaust flow out of the passenger side (thus diverting more of the exhaust through the muffler and keeping the car quiter).

Unless you plan on fabbing up a catback in the same design, you won't get the same sound just by picking up one of the mufflers from the list above.

- Justin

 

I may not have any business posting since I'm a dumb broad, but I bought a 1991 GTA with a mere 305 engine and "weak" would best describe the sound emanating from her chambers. I added a Borla exhaust and soon after installed a K&N air filter kit (thank you Pinky for your advice).

I believe the engine is cammed, as the car definitely lopes low and mean and there is some slight vacuum pressure issues I'm dealing with on takeoff, but that's another thread. Insofar as sound, she growls and grumbles and like say, she lopes with the effort. It's difficult to describe; too cool for words.

Today, two guys approached me at the gas station to ask me about the sound of my car. They crawled underneath her, all around, to the extent I was asked to pop the hood so they could see what produced the sound of muscle throwing back to the 60's era in a 'modern' 1991. Needless to write, they were both very impressed and obviously knew a lot more about cars than me, which doesn't take much considering I was lucky to be able to pop the hood for them!

With all due respect, I've since heard other cars with lesser and even fancier muffler systems (titanium) and it's still not the same as the low, intimidating growl of the Borla, in my opinion. It's expensive, yes, very, plus I had some custom work done to it as I did away with the cat and the pipes, all stainless steel exhaust, run straight from the shorty Edelbrock headers. Talk about ridiculous sounding. The car may only be a 305, but she sounds absolutely incredible! Imagine if I put a bigger engine in her. Thanks to Borla, I'm flat broke, maybe some other day. Lol.

 

Okay he told me he was going to ditch the plates ($50 a year for customs) so if it had the birds it's probably mine. No one else had those things haha. They were custom birdies from brent franker in reflective blue. Was the driver black? I sold it to a black guy named edward. He could have sold it by now though. Where did you see it at?

Yeah you'll need to fab up a TV cable mount, the burban was a TH400. I didn't even realize that when I sold it to you, if you want some help messin with it I'll be happy to come over and give you a hand. Shouldn't be too hard.
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Lol anyone can post here if they're into cars.

The borla does sound good, I must admit.

 

definately not... my 2055's were 360 from summit and then 140 to coat the headers....

thats 500 bucks with Jet hot coated headers and regular non coated y pipe. even with y pipe coated, it wouldnt be too much over 600



as far as the borla is concerned, i dont see the big deal with it. it runs an open pipe with the plate open. barely any exhaust will go thru the muffler. adn with it fully closed, it dont sound all that great..its real quiet. why spend that much money (the tips alone cost over 120 bucks if remember right. i do like the tips tho.) on a system to run a straight pipe? which i might say sounds kinda bad. i ran a straight pipe for 2 days. idle was kinda cool but other than that it didnt have tone. you'd be much better making longtubes into true duals with bullets/chambered tubes or spintech singel chamber race mufflers. it will give you nice tone and very deep sound

i really like the SLP loudmouth or dynomouth for Ls1 cars and Lt1 cars

 

https://mywebspace.wisc.edu/gmarsicek/web/GregDrive.MPG
My magnaflow sounds good. A lot of it too is true duals. Think about how good mustangs sound most of the time. True duals gives you good sound.

Cubic inches, heads and cams will effect sound.

 

Unfortunately, just a Borla muffler on it's own (from the list you gave), isn't likely to sound the same as a 3-4th gen specific cat-back.

The great thing about Borla's ajustable cat-back, is just that, it's adjustable. You can fine-tune the sound to your liking. The system comes with 4 interchangeable "plates" with various size opening's, which you slide between the passenger-side tail-pipe flange and the end of the intermediate pipe, just before it branches off to the muffler.

The bigger the opening on the plate, the more exhaust is able to "bypass" the muffler. A solid plate means 100% of the exhaust is routed through the muffler. Going that route, your car will have a very smooth, mild, tone Very refined. Nothing loud or offensive. But enough to let you know something's there. Of coarse, you could always not run any plate at all which means most of the exhaust bypasses the muffler completely and you'll be setting off car-alarms and attracting the attention of every cop within a 5 block radius

If the exhaust is routed straight through the muffler, the sound will NOT be what you're looking for as it's pretty quite. But not running a plate or runing one with a 1" opening, will.

Keep in mind that it's not just the muffler that controls the way a car sounds. It's the biggest factor, yes, but things like the diameter of the piping, it's length and the size,shape and length of the tail pipes all influence the way a car sounds.

Put a set of "turn-downs on a car that originally ran a set of straight-tips, and it will completley change the tone of the exhaust. Rectangular tip's, duel tips, slash-cut tips, they all have an influence your exhaust sounds.

You can see from this picture, why Borla's Fbody exhaust sound so much different than everyone else's.

The adjustable exhaust bypass, the intercooled quad (square) tips (as well as the muffler itself) are what makes this exhaust sound closest to a 60's muscle car, than anything else short of a true duel exhaust.

The down-side is that it's the m ostexpensive exhaust for our cars so not too many people have them.

So in short, to answer your question, I highly doubt just buying a Borla "muffler" alone will be get you the sound you want. You'd really have to get the whole set-up because it's all the factors I mentioned above, is what makes this particular exhaust sound the way it does.

Of all those mufflers you listed though, I'm 99% sure it's the XR-1 that comes with the kit.

http://store.summitracing.com/partde...5&autoview=sku

4th gen Fbody



3rd gen Fbody


EDIT:

A little off topic,I just got a quote from a Canadian distributer, and got a quote for the Borla set-up for my '88. The tips are different than the 4th gen style, but that doesn't matter because I won't be using them (I don't like seeing exhaust tips on Iroc's)

In the next 2-3 weeks, I'll be placing an order and as soon as it arrives, I'll post some video clips. I'm kinda curious myself to see what it sounds like on an L98

 

im going to e running 2 1/2 true dual with flowmaster singel chamber 10series dumped on mine once the motor is back in and i got the idea from searching the 4thgen boards. i know the ls1's have a sound of there own but here is a few of links on how that setup sounds i think it sorta sounds similar to what you want




http://www.ls1sounds.com/true_duals/..._01SS_idle.mpg


http://www.ls1sounds.com/true_duals/...m_01SS_rev.mpg