If you've ever run your ZT w/o muffler please chime in here!

[Guest bastaad525]

Okay wellllllllllllllll I got the message on my answering machine today they got the wiring issue FIXED (ended up the whole harness was FUBAR so they just wired in another one) and my car should be ready for pick up TOMMOROW wooooooooooooooooooooooohooooooooooooooo finally man I HATE being without my Z it has been a stressful week indeed! Now when I pick her up there will be NO exhaust save for the downpipe coming off the turbo and that's it, so I'm gonna need to make a beeline to the exhaust place, but the thing is I have not really figured out what I'm gonna be doing when I get there. I really like the idea of going muffler-less, and I have read of more than a few guys who have done this on their turbo Z's, and claim that it's not too loud at all, no louder than say a mustang gt (Tyson280zx and and Steve "Stealth" Webb). I know a few guys on here have said it is pretty loud, comparable maybe to a harley or some such chopper, which would definately be too loud for me. My budget is definately tight... and it sux because I can't afford to do what I REALLY want to do right now (such as mandrel bends yes I know I know I WILL put them in there but for now I need to just get the car driveable and RELATIVELY quiet so I have a means of getting to work everyday!) and I will very soon be taking it all back off and doing another one from scratch. NO there is no way around this for me unless the car is quiet enough with just the downpipe to let me get away with street driving for a month or so, which I doubt.

 

So the question is, can any of you guys who have run JUST A PIPE with no cat or muffler, on your turbo z's, chime in and tell me is it gonna be way too loud or what? I'm more concerned about John Law than anything else... I dont mind it being loud so it's not how it aesthetically affects me. Lots of cops around my area usually and I dont want to be so loud as to get pulled over for not having a muffler. Is adding a pipe out the back even going to cut down the sound at all from just having the downpipe? It doesn't seem like it would....

 

I can't afford to have them redo this twice tommorow... so I can't just hope/assume I can get away w/o the muffler only to find it will be too loud. But... this has cost pretty much right up to my budget limit and putting a muffler on there is gonna hurt for the next week or so so if I can do without, even for a little while, then I will. Please chime in here guys!

[Guest bastaad525]

Hey and just outta curiousity, is this motor gonna be a lot more powerful with just the downpipe on there and nothing after that? I'm figuring there was a lot of restriction in a factory stock exhaust system (I know the downpipe is pretty bad too...) Think it would be something noticeable? If only I had the money to go dyno it before and after

[David K]

People like Tyson dont live in a HUGE metro area with lots of traffic, like we do. I used to have a 2.5 inch OPEN exhaust on my 79. In traffic, i wanted to pull my hair out, because you cannot relax with the engine rumbling and screaming out of that exhaust pipe. You can get relatively cheap and ok quality mufflers from Pep Boys or Auto Zone. before i ditched that 79, and got my current 79, i bought a Cherry Bomb Turbo II Muffler from Auto Zone for $30, and it was ok. I made sure my buddy welded the can where the inlet pipe went in, so it would not seperate and leak, as those cheap mufflers are just pressed together. It gave the car a very nice rumble, and it was quiet. Im sure that exact muffler comes in 3 inch if you need it, mine was 2.5

 

$30 and 1 hour cutting and welding. 8)

[Guest bastaad525]

I'm assuming you mean '79 N/A ZX? I can't imagine running an N/A w/o any kind of muffler.... I remember when we first fired up my built up 2.9 N/A motor with only the head on there... omfg was that a racket!! However, as I understand it this wont necessarily be the case with the turbo engine that I just had installed... the turbo itself acts to muffle the sound compared to what you'd hear in an N/A... I'm just trying to figure out how much the turbo will do exactly, and if it will allow me to run w/o a muffler on there.

 

Tysons car was also a turbo, I know he mentioned taking the muffler off but he did not say whether he also removed the cat or not, I assume it was still on there. Will a cat converter muffle the exhaust note?

[David K]

Anything in the exhaust tract will muffle sound. Yes im talking about N/A in my reply, but i think at idle, the sound of the 2 engines arent all that different....well maybe...just by a little im sure. You could always have them weld a resonator right after the cat, if you are running a cat. Are you?

 

I remember when i got my first set of headers on my old 79. Racket it was! I had to drive 10 miles to a muffler shop owned by a Z guy, in the late morning, with open headers

 

On a good note, a buddy of mine i just called said the turbo they installed on the family Patrol, quieted the engine noise down a lot 8)

[Guest bastaad525]

nope no cat no nothing, just the pipe straight off the turbo... And I've heard this turbo motor at idle with just the downpipe, it's not too bad at all at idle... louder than my N/A was w/muffler and glasspack but not by much. Now when we fired up the N/A with just the header it was HORRID even at idle... the manager of our building recieved a lot of phonecalls complaining....

[fl327]

ran open dp on a my Lturbo, which is almost 8-1cr ratio, wasnt THAT loud, but the spooling noise is insane, you sound like a supercharged dragster, its kinda raspy, and you hit boost really fast.. an NA motor is quite louder without exhaust. it is quiet for having no exhaust, BUT IT IS NOT QUIET. plus with the dp right in front of you open where it is, it will get stinky in the cabin.

 

drove a N42 turbo with open dp, pretty loud, and the same supercharged dragster noise. it was quite louder than my L28et engine, and noticebly peppier off boost, side note.

 

Randy 77zt was running no muffler for a while, and it wasnt very loud at all, basically sounded like an NA with a glasspack until he got on it, then it sounded pretty dang good- i doubt you would get a ticket running this combo, look at all the hondas with the fart cans out there-you would be quieter than them, with no muffler!!!!

 

I run a 3" mandrel system with a Borla XR1 muffler off a stock dp, and i swear by them, after having nothing but flowmasters and ricer brand mufflers prior, i guess any straight thru muffler design would be good if you go with a muffler at all. I spent the money on a good SS muffler and was paid back with a smooth Euro sounding car that doesnt drone on the freeway, no cackeling, Im not sure how loud the exhaust is really, since I usually have the stereo cranked up and dont have as good of an ear for it as I used to.

[Sparky]

Comparing a NA cars open exhaust to what you can expect from your turbo car is silly, two completely different animals.

 

I ran with an open 3" DP (DP was about 1.8ft long) for a day or two, as stated before, you can really hear the turbo chopping the air away, but it is kinda loud (nothing I would drive for a while, but a couple days is a-ok)

 

I then went and had a Straight 3" system built that dumps at the diff in a funky turn down bend/cut. I LOVE IT! and plan to keep it that way for a while, The only thing that bothered me about it on its 200mile maiden voyage, was the heat coming off the DP cooking my feet

 

Im running a T04B with a larger turbine so the sounds might be a little different, But I promise that it will be quiter than 90% of all those fart honduhs out there.

 

I also know alot of turbo guys that run straight pipe, no cop problems what so ever, and the sound is just Soooooo sweet,

 

makes me feel like a little kid when I hear thier cars comming around the corner.

 

When running a muffler, get a straight through design, the goal is to run as little backpressure after the turbo as possible.

[mobythevan]

I've been running my 240z turbo for the last three months with nothing but the stock downpipe. My wife says its not that loud. She says that she thinks many cars with glasspacks are louder, just her opinion. It is definitely not loud when you are off the turbo and just cruising. When you hit the turbo, now that is a different story, but still I say it not bad. But remember I ran my 350 sbc with just open shorties to go to the muffler shop, now that is LOUD

 

BTW, I have all of my exhasut and dowpipe parts in hand, but waiting to install my T-5 before building the exhaust. $150 for all parts to make the 2.5inch mandrel downpipe and 3 inch mandrel exhaust.

[Lockjaw]

I ran mine like that just to test it, and abdolutely hated it. Why would you want something that loud?

 

Buy a Hooker Maxflo 3 inch straight thru muffler from Summit for 50 bucks, and be done with it. You want the exhaust to be quiet enough for you to hear if the engine detonates, and if for nothing else, have some respect for your fellow motorists.

 

You have no idea how loud it gets when you are on it. Its loud.

[mobythevan]

I should mention again that I live out in BFE. I only have about 6 neighbors within 5 miles.

 

I never drove mine to town that way, just passing along the info

 

Just another redneck moment in the life of my 240z

[BayAreaZT]

Congratulations on getting the swap done Glad to hear the delay was just minor. Maybe you could just run a short pipe off the DP and clamp on a resonated tip. That should quiet it down a little bit and it's cheap. You don't have to run it all the way to the back.

[Guest bastaad525]

Thanks everyone for the input here!! well it seems the majority agree that the sound is not so bad w/o a muffler so I wont worry about putting one on today... a lot of people seem to really think it's got a nice sound to it. I also like the idea of not even running the exhaust all the way to the back... I was thinking of having it 'dump' or stop and point down right at where the diff is too, this would avoid having to use those two sharp 90* bends at the rear of the car and should result in a very free flowing exhaust. I've never heard of a resonating tip before, or didn't realize that's what they did, but I will put one on there to help with the noise.

 

Lockjaw - believe it or not I am a pretty conscientious neighbor... when I first put my N/A motor into the 240 with just a muffler, it was still very loud, and though I did like the sound, I hated that it set off all the car alarms in my apartment building when I came and went. I dont want my car to be annoying.... as a matter of fact I want it to garner as little attention as possible from ANYONE. As stated before however I end up doing the exhaust right now will really be only a temp fix until I have some more money saved up to do what I REALLY want, which is mandrel bends and a nice muffler to keep the thing quiet and make it sound good and not set off any alarms!

 

Sparky - thank you for confirming my fear about running the open DP... heheh I wasn't sure exactly if was gonna be coming up under the floor pan by my feet or my seat... now I know... cooked feet ughhhh oh well that's not too bad, I figured the smell was gonna be in the car bigtime too... and just after I finally got all my rubber seals fixed to get rid of that... oh well, I've perfected driving with my head out the window into an art!

 

Thanks again for the input guys and for some really good ideas as well... well the clock is ticking I'm gonna see if I can arrange a ride to go pick up my car right now, otherwise gotta wait til my g/f gets home at 6pm I can't waaaaaaaaaaaaaaaait

[Guest zpeedracer25]

I've got old rusty(light weight..hehe) 2.5" exhaust on mine and just a turn down tip on the end. Its not any louder then a stock Mustang exhaust and the turbo spool up is awesome! Remember any bends they put in the pipe will quiet it down somewhat just like a high flow muffler. I plan on replacing mine soon because I don't like the exhaust note it puts out and it has too many rusted through holes. I'm gonna go with a Dynomax Bullet race muffler which is a straight through design and fairly cheap.

[Mudge]

i doubt you would get a ticket running this combo, look at all the hondas with the fart cans out there-you would be quieter than them, with no muffler!!!!

 

I have encountered MANY a Honda that have been louder than my 411 RWHP Camaro on the street. Even with open exaust on the street it never seemed that annoying, the bullhorn tips really give some effect on those cars.

 

I had twice pipes (glasspacks) on my 240Z and it was kind of loud, Lens car was a bit quiet but sounded really nice what that muffler.

[randy 77zt]

i have a scotty dp hooked to 3" pipe with a magnaflow straight through no baffle type muffler.sounds good .i tore up the magnaflow at thill off of turn 5.now i am trying open 3" .the back is 2 90degree 3" mandrel bends.

[Guest szlash280z]

BTW' date=' I have all of my exhasut and dowpipe parts in hand, but waiting to install my T-5 before building the exhaust. $150 for all parts to make the 2.5inch mandrel downpipe and 3 inch mandrel exhaust.[/quote']

 

 

wow that is cheap! are you doing the welds yourself? I was quoted around $350 to do my exhaust, with press bent pipes even. I don't know if that included a press bent DP though, since I was talking to him about getting a pipe made there.

 

so you ran your 240 without any pipes coming off the Downpipe? It didn't melt your compression bushings or anything? how bad was the exhaust smell?

 

I personally like quiet exhaust. I don't want anyone to know how hard I am trying to drive at any given time. If you lose, you can always claim you weren't racing if they can't hear your engine howling! I always laugh at ricers with the fart cannons, you can hear them revving to high heaven but the car doesn't go very fast away from you, it's especially funny in heavy traffic as they rev really high just to stop in 20ft.

[Guest szlash280z]

plus, I hate the crackling exhaust that I hear all the ricers with. BZZZZZZZZZ snap crackle pop! it's like they got rice crispies in there or something. That sounds like shit!

 

does a turbo car with no muffler sound all crackly like that?

[mobythevan]

Yeah, I ran mine that way, but only for test drives. Maybe I put 120 miles on it in the country that way. One drive alone that I took was 60 miles. Several other test drives were only a couple miles each. The exhasut smell was bad when I would be coasting along. That is the main reason for me to get the exhaust finished, I am tired of breathing the fumes. That bushing is probably a little charred now, but I planned to replace all of the bushings after everything else is finalized. That price of $150 is just for all of the pieces, flanges, pipe, muffler, o2 bung, etc. I will weld it all up myself with my MIG.

[Guest szlash280z]

what types of flanges are you going to use?