rtbiscuit Posted April 11, 2012 Share Posted April 11, 2012 Well my exhaust is starting to look like its seen better days, i can see rust peeling up inside the exhaust tips, the system looks like its been used for BB gun target practice and alot of the flanges and pipes are rusted to fuggary. not only that the external walls of the cats are starting to go through. I'm really excited i'm now booked in for a custom built exhaust with longlife i visited the guys last friday, and have been waiting for the quote to come through. IT arrived today all seems good so i've booked in for a full system. sadly i have to wait till tuesday next week now as they are all booked up. They are going to build me 2 200 cell sports cats and a full cat back system as well. we discussed setups etc and they showed me some of their work, i took some pictures of other exhaust systems along and they are going to build it to my specification. This will include an X-pipe 2 small resonators after the X leading to 2 silencers at the back with my choice of tip on it. I'm hoping this will give me the noise and setup i want. I'll try and take before and after pictures when it goes in, but sadly i'm back at work next week so i can;t hang around while they do it. this might be a good thing as its going to be a full days job apparently . I'm using the guys at Demand engineering in stonham aspall in suffolk as its just up the road from me, but they are reallly good. when i went to visit them they were both great guys, really friendly and both huge petrol heads, they knew their cars and they knew their stuff, and i was impressed with the quality of their welding. and i feel happy for them to work on my P&J. I did a lot of research and it was a close call between longlife and powerflow. but the swing factor was that longlife use a better grade of stainless on all of their system, and the quality of the fabricators was better locally at longlife. I looked at ICS warrior but heard horror stories, and A14 performance was to far away and could find very little about them. So fingers crossed this all goes well and i'll keep the thread updated with before and after pictures hopefully. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Will370z Posted April 11, 2012 Share Posted April 11, 2012 Ummm looking forward to seeing and hearing the results. Keep us posted Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Bakes100 Posted April 11, 2012 Share Posted April 11, 2012 What were the grades of stainless both companies use out of interest? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
maxi-glasgow Posted April 11, 2012 Share Posted April 11, 2012 It was the one thing which disappointed me with the XKR, the exhaust. It was too quiet. I had looked into getting the middle silencer removed and putting an H pipe in as a lot of the guys in the States do that to get the next level of noise of the Zorst. Some even remove the rear silencers but I only wanted to be able to hear the V8, not get my ears blown off. Ended up not getting round to it, but it was a guy from Germany who flew over with his son to buy it and they had already booked themselves into Arden to get the exhaust changed as I had told him it was disappointing the noise it made.... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rtbiscuit Posted April 11, 2012 Author Share Posted April 11, 2012 What were the grades of stainless both companies use out of interest? Longlife use T304 stainless steel for all parts of their exhaust and tig weld all joints. i think powerflow use T304 for some parts but not all. It was the one thing which disappointed me with the XKR, the exhaust. It was too quiet. I had looked into getting the middle silencer removed and putting an H pipe in as a lot of the guys in the States do that to get the next level of noise of the Zorst. Some even remove the rear silencers but I only wanted to be able to hear the V8, not get my ears blown off. Ended up not getting round to it, but it was a guy from Germany who flew over with his son to buy it and they had already booked themselves into Arden to get the exhaust changed as I had told him it was disappointing the noise it made.... Arden cost a fortune, good stuff but sooooooooooooooooooooooooo expensive Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ekona Posted April 11, 2012 Share Posted April 11, 2012 Remove all cats. Install straight through pipes. ??????? Profit. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rtbiscuit Posted April 11, 2012 Author Share Posted April 11, 2012 Remove all cats. Install straight through pipes. ??????? Profit. still have to have Cats as its post 1991 so car is required to have them. and i don't want to be doing the decat shuffle every 12 months. i must admit for the price i'm getting it all done for i'm laughing, i'm saving £250 over the cheapest sports cats i can find for the jag and that doesn;t include fitting as well. i also think de catted leads to nasty rasps that shouldn't be there. decats sounded harsh on the zed, its why i went the sports cat route on my old 350. and also i want to maintain some pressure in the system as making it to free flow i'll lose low down torque to gain high end, and to be honest i have no problem with the high end. the design should allow an increase in torque across the range and improve lowdown power and unleash the V8 noise. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ekona Posted April 11, 2012 Share Posted April 11, 2012 Go for some resonated decats then, if you don't want the raspy sounds. Personally that's what I'm going for on the MX-5, and the end pipe will be left as plain as can be so I can bolt any old sounds reducer onto it for trackdays. If I go by when the car was registered in this country then I need cats too, but if I point the MOT tester to the VIN number and ask them to look it up on their system they won't be able to find it and I can go catless I take it you've sorted all the spark issues and the leaky gasket things? Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rtbiscuit Posted April 11, 2012 Author Share Posted April 11, 2012 Go for some resonated decats then, if you don't want the raspy sounds. Personally that's what I'm going for on the MX-5, and the end pipe will be left as plain as can be so I can bolt any old sounds reducer onto it for trackdays. If I go by when the car was registered in this country then I need cats too, but if I point the MOT tester to the VIN number and ask them to look it up on their system they won't be able to find it and I can go catless I take it you've sorted all the spark issues and the leaky gasket things? lol yes the coil packs are all firing on all 8 cylinders and i replaced the leaking cam cover gaskets before christmas. still have other stuff to fix just fancied treating the car to something other than replacement parts as for your little MX5 if its an import then you don't need cats and de cat away. it is after all a track car. sadly the jag needs them so will be having sport cats. to give you guys an idea of costs for XKR exhausts, you lot like the milltek setup and they do them for the XKR its just over £1000 for un resonated and just under £1200 for a resonated version, and thats just the cat back system. the hi flow cats are an additional £1200 so well over £2000 without even fitting it. if you go down the arden route, and there stuff is very good but the cat back alone is £3300 before fitting. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ekona Posted April 11, 2012 Share Posted April 11, 2012 to give you guys an idea of costs for XKR exhausts, you lot like the milltek setup and they do them for the XKR its just over £1000 for un resonated and just under £1200 for a resonated version, and thats just the cat back system. the hi flow cats are an additional £1200 so well over £2000 without even fitting it. I never showed you the bill for the 911 exhausts, did I? Makes that seem cheap Go look up the price of the Tubistyle Veyron exhausts, will make you feel a whole lot better Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rtbiscuit Posted April 11, 2012 Author Share Posted April 11, 2012 to give you guys an idea of costs for XKR exhausts, you lot like the milltek setup and they do them for the XKR its just over £1000 for un resonated and just under £1200 for a resonated version, and thats just the cat back system. the hi flow cats are an additional £1200 so well over £2000 without even fitting it. I never showed you the bill for the 911 exhausts, did I? Makes that seem cheap Go look up the price of the Tubistyle Veyron exhausts, will make you feel a whole lot better i did see the price of the acropovic exhausts for the porsche weren't they like £9k or something silly. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ekona Posted April 11, 2012 Share Posted April 11, 2012 They are and I'd love one, but not for that kind of money. No exhaust is worth that IMHO unless you're trying to save every last little bit of weight for racing. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kavik Posted April 11, 2012 Share Posted April 11, 2012 Looking forward to seeing/hearing what you end up with as 'her indoors' has an 06 XK. Sounds great when first stomping on the gas and pulling away, but seems to go quieter the higher it revs. Need to hear that V8 sound all the time, and at a few more db Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rtbiscuit Posted April 16, 2012 Author Share Posted April 16, 2012 well i dropped the car off this evening and i have been given a lovely nissan for my courtesy car. its a nice blue primera. and to give it a fair cop it actually drives pretty good. so the work starts on the car tomorrow. sadly i didn;t get chance to take any pics before it went in. but one of the guys said he'd takes pics through the day for me to show the progress, so i'll upload those when i get them. I've picked out my new exhaust tips. so i can wave good bye to the pea shooters. also decided to go for a mid sport sound. as its an everyday car i thought full sport would be too much. but if i want more noise they'll make some changes down the road for me if i want them. I'm all excited can;t wait till pickup tomorrow. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Cragus Posted April 16, 2012 Share Posted April 16, 2012 We want sound clips too Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SunsetZed Posted April 18, 2012 Share Posted April 18, 2012 So where are the pictures... Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rtbiscuit Posted April 18, 2012 Author Share Posted April 18, 2012 So where are the pictures... got a call yesterday and they had ordered the wrong HFC sections they were very apologetic, and the correct ones would be in today. just spoke to them earlier and the correct parts didn't arrive till 11.30, but they were working hard but he wasn't confident that it would be completed today. I'm not to worried as i have a courtesy car form them so i'm able to get around etc. they've been really good, and i'd rather them have it an extra day or so and do a great job, than for them to rush it and do an OK job. so might be picking up tonight, but more likely tomorrow. It hasn't affected the price so i'm not complaining. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
SunsetZed Posted April 18, 2012 Share Posted April 18, 2012 Fair enough, I'm just looking forward to the pic's (in case you hadn't guessed!). Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rtbiscuit Posted April 19, 2012 Author Share Posted April 19, 2012 Ok just got back from the lads at demand engineering and i must say i'm still smiling i've got photos to upload and some video, but i thought i'd share this little video with you. I asked the boys to capture some video of it running just off the HFC's for a laugh and they sent me this link they told me over the phone it sounded like a torpedo boat, and they weren't half wrong which has now made me want to add 2 lectric cut out valves at a later date for fun. IUshall upload the pics and add to this in a bit enjoy. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Kavik Posted April 19, 2012 Share Posted April 19, 2012 Nice sound I'd just leave it like that Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ekona Posted April 19, 2012 Share Posted April 19, 2012 Absolutely, that sounds means hell! Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rtbiscuit Posted April 19, 2012 Author Share Posted April 19, 2012 So the exhaust has been built by Demand Engineering in suffolk, just outside stonham Aspall. You wouldn't know they were there, but they are some what of a diamond find. This is the workshop and these 2 hansome chaps are the boys behind the steel; now don't let looks deceive you they are both highly trained engineers (slightly unflattering photo but by this point i think they were knackered as they'd been working hard all day) Old Exhaust I managed to get some pics of the old exhaust but it had been taken off, but i'll find a pic off the net showing what the original layout was, but you can see how knackered my old system was. The tips had even rusted through And this is what they built for me New exhaust X-Pipe they built me a lovely X-pipe Hi FLow Cats and squeezed in some lovely HFC's it now runs 4 silencers nstead of 5 with 2 on each bank 1 before the rear axleand one after. and these are the rear cans I've been really impressed with the quality of the Tig welding, and they done an absolute top job with the fit and manufacture of it. i think its a stunning bit of kit and fits the car beautifully. everything is perfectly laid out, in line and neatly welded. and the x ppe is a work of art. and its all been custom buitl for me. apparently the cars were a pig to fit as there is almost no space what so ever either side of the engine. its tighter than a ducks arse gettng in there. well i'll leave you all to have a look, and i'll post up the short vid in a bit and i'll let you know what i think of the noise. i'm off to go have my dinner as i'm starving. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Vik54 Posted April 19, 2012 Share Posted April 19, 2012 Looks good Rich Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
Ekona Posted April 19, 2012 Share Posted April 19, 2012 That all looks seriously, seriously impressive mate. Can't wait to hear it in the flesh Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
rtbiscuit Posted April 19, 2012 Author Share Posted April 19, 2012 now when i say this is a short video and not the best i really mean it, it was taken about 30 sec after they finished fitting it, and about 5 seconds after i worked out how to video stuff on my DSLR. so i will at the weekend go out and get some decent footage. i missed the inital startup, but you get a very quick idea of the exhaust. before i write a final conclusion on the system i want to add some miles to it, just in the 30 miles drive home its already started to change in noise. its liek the car is just starting to get its voice back. and admittedly when i took this the engine was still cold. I'm really pleased with the noise so far, as its a daily driver i couldn't have a permanent torpedo boat, even if the thought of it is tempting. and i wanted to maintain the cruise-ability that the jag has. and this exhaust has done just that. at motorway speeds its almost invisible just like the original system, but this one barks when you use the loud pedal. at the moemnt the system has added a nice bit of extra noise but keep with the character of the car, its deeper and has more of a boom to it. the is slightly more noise in the cabin, but i mean slight, its not a drone but the system is just that bit more noticable, but perfectly within the parameters i had expected. i'm looking forward to seeing how the sound develops over the next month or so. i'm hoping for alittle more burble and some more popple and back fire. the ECU needs time to adjust to the system, and it needs to coke up abit and bed in so to speak. but the key thing is i'm really happy with it. its tidied up the back of the car getting rid of the pea shooters, adding some proper pipes to it and bringing out a bit more of the big Cat sound. a huge thanks goes out to Dan and Dave who have worked very hard over the last 2 days making everything perfect, they've done a top job and i wouldn't hesitate to reccomend them and their services. I'm also really pleased with the quality of the Longlife products, the boxes pipes and Cats all seem very high standard and its topped off by the very high quality welding from the boys. If your interested in them doing something for you they are worth a visit. http://demandengineering.co.uk/ they can do exhausts, HFC's Decats and manifolds as well as a host of other stuff. and the price was very good, all in it came in more than half the cost of a full miltek system including Hi flow cats and thats without any kind of fitting included. i'll post up at the weekend with new video, and an updated review in a few weeks. Quote Link to comment Share on other sites More sharing options...
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