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keep or ditch flowmaster?

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Old Mar 5, 2006 | 04:30 PM
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Default keep or ditch flowmaster?

i will be doing lt's, y-pipe, cut out, cats soon

i have the stock system w/ a flowmaster muffler right now, should i put a dif catback on at this time

i plan on adding a cam by summer, how will this system be w/ a closed cutout, i heard a lot of bad things about flowmaster
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Old Mar 5, 2006 | 04:45 PM
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I'm dumping mine
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Old Mar 5, 2006 | 04:47 PM
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I got one free I miss stock
I think that says enough.
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Old Mar 5, 2006 | 04:49 PM
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I would ditch the flowmaster.
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Old Mar 5, 2006 | 04:52 PM
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whats the reasoning behind this, itll save some cash if its not worth it
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Old Mar 5, 2006 | 04:54 PM
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Originally Posted by jwhert
whats the reasoning behind this, itll save some cash if its not worth it
Sound is bad, muffler alone is not as good as a full catback.
The muffler isn't that good anyway.
My car isn't horridly loud but its ALL drone. Was great stock now I see why this muffler was free..
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Old Mar 5, 2006 | 04:57 PM
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I guess technically flowmaster's flow the worst, but if you like the sound and have the cutout for flow, i'd say keep it (unless its all stock piping, then I say get a whole new catback). If you are going LT's and a ORY most all cams I'd say 224 > will really liven it up (I'm really a newbie, so someone help out).

And from what I hear, it's worth it to get all the little things out of the way first right before the cam like TB, since the cam's going in get a pulley, 02's already have the ls6 intake so you are set on that, etc.
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Old Mar 5, 2006 | 05:12 PM
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Lol well besides the fact that flowmasters are one of the most popular the one that sounds good or better you might say most likely would be based on the combination of ypipe headers and other bolton combinations.

Last edited by 98t56TA; Mar 5, 2006 at 05:17 PM. Reason: typo
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Old Mar 5, 2006 | 05:43 PM
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Drop the flowmaster, it may sound better than stock, but your flow isnt even stock.
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Old Mar 6, 2006 | 08:00 AM
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Anyway well based on what your here and the variety of differences there are those that sound good and some that don't.

Last edited by 98t56TA; Mar 6, 2006 at 08:05 AM.
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Old Mar 6, 2006 | 05:54 PM
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I ditched the flowmaster system that came with my car after I did lt headers & ory. The main reason I got rid of it was that everyone here said that the flowmasters don't flow very well and I didn't want anything holding my car back for future mods. I also didn't like the drone with the flowmaster either. I went with the hooker system which I am now quite happy with. If you really want to be cheap you could stick with the flowmaster system and just get an electric cutout to open when you need max power, but the difference between the $ an electric cutout and the $ of the hooker cat back system is less than $100. If I remember right ls1sounds.com has a clip of a flowmaster setup with lt headers and it does sound pretty good though.
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Old Mar 6, 2006 | 07:31 PM
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I always here people saying flowmaster dosent flow well, Can sombody show a dyno graph to prove it or are people just going off what others are saying?
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Old Mar 6, 2006 | 07:38 PM
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I don't know what they flow, but the quality of construction is bad. Look at one close and see how bad the welds are. I guess proof is in the marketing....like Fram oil filters, but thats another story.
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Old Mar 6, 2006 | 07:46 PM
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I dont know about the dyno graph but I saw one somewhere so do a search and Im sure you can find it. this is talked about a lot. I ditched my flowmaster for the new SLP modular version and I f#cken love it. I think it sounds better than any ive heard. I really recomend getting rid of it. You can pick up the SLP from lmperformance for $377 and shipping is free
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Old Mar 6, 2006 | 07:58 PM
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The flowmaster that sucks is the 80 series crossflow muffler that comes in the catbacks for fbody's. Chambered mufflers just don't do well in crossflow applications. A magnaflow or hooker catback is a better choice if you want to stick with a catback.

Not all flowmasters are bad mufflers though, I've got single chamber race mufflers on my dual setup and they are badass!!!
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Old Mar 6, 2006 | 09:45 PM
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Get rid of the flowmaster. Ive never heard anything good about it.
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Old Mar 6, 2006 | 09:46 PM
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Well unfortunately I don't have my old one anymore but there are probably a number of ways to say if there is really a cfm difference that you would notice switching from one to another. I could guess there is a proportionate increase in terms of velocity but a minute difference in regards to price certainly when you are combining aftermarket components and a catback at the same time.
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Old Mar 7, 2006 | 05:24 AM
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you won't find anything other than "this person lost xxrwhp on the dyno...no I don't have any sheets/proof/etc". Seems that while everyone likes to bash the Flowmaster no one actually has stepped up to back up their claims and proven its bad. This comes up occasionally, and personally until someone can prove to me its that bad I'm staying with it because I like the sound (until I go true dual Flowmasters anyway )
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Old Mar 8, 2006 | 06:32 PM
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flowmaster on my 98 ta saturday and i would swear my low end suffers.. ordering mangaflow.
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Old Mar 8, 2006 | 06:39 PM
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my dad claims the car got slower after we installed just a flowmaster catback about a year adn a half ago. I ditched it for GMMG which I should have bought in the first place, dont even get me started on how much a pain my flowmaster american thunder catback was and how many problems it created.
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