Exhaust gurus help!!!!
03-23-2012, 11:27 AM
#1
Exhaust gurus help!!!! Decided to just make this a thread because its a topic that i see discussed but never see reasons for certain sounds other than mufflers. I know pipe diameter and lengths and even bends come into play but i still havnt found what combos will produce certain sounds like low grumbly sounding setups opposed to high peppy sounding setups. Anyways, here is my issue please provide input and advice if you can. Thanks
Im having trouble making this car sound decent. The 01 ls1 i had was cake i could throw a coffee can on that thing and it would sound good but not this car! when i bought my 01 it had a flomaster muffler on it and big chrome tips that imo look very tacky and redneckish lol. anyways i had an appointment to have my exhaust redone on the 01 and i decided that before i went i was gonna sawzall off the old axle back just for ***** n giggs to see how it sounded. I cut everything off to where i had a few feet of straight pipe after the y merge left. Well after that i jumped in and fired it up and as expected it didnt sound great at low rpm and had a good bit of rasp. So for the fun of it i pulled out from a light and let the ol gal loose and when i did i couldnt believe my ears!! The thing sounded amazing and oddly enough it sounded like it was reving through the roof. im talking like 9k rpm was the sound comin from that thing lol. Yes i know it was still at the normal rpm range but some how it sounded way higher and i liked it so much i left it that way for a while and cancelled my appointment. That was a few years back and now that, that car is long gone and i have this lt1 toy to mess with i decided to do the same thing thinking id get the same results... NO WAY it sounded like pure crap.. This thing sounded like a straight pipped truck! awful! So i went to advanced auto and grabbed a cheap 2 chamber muffler to put on to get the noise down a bit and it def helped a lot and actually had the car sounding pretty good again. The only problem was this huge ugly muffler hanging down under the car. After a few rocks and a broken hanger later i decided to remove it again and see if i could get a better fit. Once i had the muff off i had pretty good access to the cat so i figured id slide a piece of pipe in to it to make sure the guts were still in it.... Nope, someone had gutted it at one time and put it back on... upon discovery of this i decided to remove the useless hollow cat and ditch it. the problem after that was i had no piping to put in its place so i got the bright idea to put the muff in the cats place. The good things from this was it tucked nicely and fit perfect in cat area and also let me go from my 3 inch merge at the y right into the 3 inch muff. i then put on a turn down and angled it down and to the side of the car a little bit so it would be blowing away from the body. I then took my stands out and fired it up.. Didnt sound bad at all at idol but anything above sounded terrible! I expected it to be loud but i had no idea it would sound so bad... Now the project for the day is to take it all back off and extend the single side after the y on back to at least the rearend. The main thing i dont understand is how it doesnt have the scream sound like the ls1 did. Right now i can drive it and i catch my self reving to 5 k before i change gears just because it sounds like its not reving high and i dont realize how high it actually is till its way up there. My question now is should i leave the muff and add piping to the end or remove it and put piping before it. (I know there has to be some kind of "exhaust sound theory" on this that im not finding) and also why do lt1 cars not have that high peppy sound.. i know its a completely diff engine and cat setup and even the stock manifolds are different but even with the pipping run the same as i had the other car its not even close sounding. any help would be great thanks!
Another thing, the reason why im messing with it so much is because its only gonna be temporary and i want it to sound decent while its on there. At least until i can get longtubes and some kind of texas speed like dual setup with an x pipe dumped after bullets. Its not a cheap setup so it could be a little bit before i can get it all ordered.
Im having trouble making this car sound decent. The 01 ls1 i had was cake i could throw a coffee can on that thing and it would sound good but not this car! when i bought my 01 it had a flomaster muffler on it and big chrome tips that imo look very tacky and redneckish lol. anyways i had an appointment to have my exhaust redone on the 01 and i decided that before i went i was gonna sawzall off the old axle back just for ***** n giggs to see how it sounded. I cut everything off to where i had a few feet of straight pipe after the y merge left. Well after that i jumped in and fired it up and as expected it didnt sound great at low rpm and had a good bit of rasp. So for the fun of it i pulled out from a light and let the ol gal loose and when i did i couldnt believe my ears!! The thing sounded amazing and oddly enough it sounded like it was reving through the roof. im talking like 9k rpm was the sound comin from that thing lol. Yes i know it was still at the normal rpm range but some how it sounded way higher and i liked it so much i left it that way for a while and cancelled my appointment. That was a few years back and now that, that car is long gone and i have this lt1 toy to mess with i decided to do the same thing thinking id get the same results... NO WAY it sounded like pure crap.. This thing sounded like a straight pipped truck! awful! So i went to advanced auto and grabbed a cheap 2 chamber muffler to put on to get the noise down a bit and it def helped a lot and actually had the car sounding pretty good again. The only problem was this huge ugly muffler hanging down under the car. After a few rocks and a broken hanger later i decided to remove it again and see if i could get a better fit. Once i had the muff off i had pretty good access to the cat so i figured id slide a piece of pipe in to it to make sure the guts were still in it.... Nope, someone had gutted it at one time and put it back on... upon discovery of this i decided to remove the useless hollow cat and ditch it. the problem after that was i had no piping to put in its place so i got the bright idea to put the muff in the cats place. The good things from this was it tucked nicely and fit perfect in cat area and also let me go from my 3 inch merge at the y right into the 3 inch muff. i then put on a turn down and angled it down and to the side of the car a little bit so it would be blowing away from the body. I then took my stands out and fired it up.. Didnt sound bad at all at idol but anything above sounded terrible! I expected it to be loud but i had no idea it would sound so bad... Now the project for the day is to take it all back off and extend the single side after the y on back to at least the rearend. The main thing i dont understand is how it doesnt have the scream sound like the ls1 did. Right now i can drive it and i catch my self reving to 5 k before i change gears just because it sounds like its not reving high and i dont realize how high it actually is till its way up there. My question now is should i leave the muff and add piping to the end or remove it and put piping before it. (I know there has to be some kind of "exhaust sound theory" on this that im not finding) and also why do lt1 cars not have that high peppy sound.. i know its a completely diff engine and cat setup and even the stock manifolds are different but even with the pipping run the same as i had the other car its not even close sounding. any help would be great thanks!
Another thing, the reason why im messing with it so much is because its only gonna be temporary and i want it to sound decent while its on there. At least until i can get longtubes and some kind of texas speed like dual setup with an x pipe dumped after bullets. Its not a cheap setup so it could be a little bit before i can get it all ordered.
03-23-2012, 12:47 PM
#5
That's quite the novel you've written...I find it ironic you prefer the sound of an LS over LT since most agree (me too, and I have both) LT1's or gen1's sound better than LS engines; mainly due to the different firing order. Just buy a magnaflow cat-back for your car...I have one and it is awesome. Loud, but not raspy when you get on it and fairly quiet and rumbly at idle/cruising.You're from Spruce Pine? I go up to Little Switzerland once a year....got some very fun (and scary) mountain roads up there...hwy 226a holy ****...like flying down a roller coaster. Last time up there I almost took out a guy on a bike hot ******* it up the mountain when he came in my lane in one of those very tight switchbacks. A very good test of your driving skills and suspension/braking. I highly recommend trying it out if anybody is in the mountains of NC.
Last edited by ahritchie; 03-23-2012 at 01:36 PM.
03-23-2012, 01:29 PM
#7
That's quite the novel you've written...I find it ironic you prefer the sound of an LS over LT since most agree (me too, and I have booth) LT1's or gen1's sound better than LS engines; mainly due to the different firing order. Just buy a magnaflow cat-back for your car...I have one and it is awesome. Loud, but not raspy when you get on it and fairly quiet and rumbly at idle/cruising.You're from Spruce Pine? I go up to Little Switzerland once a year....got some very fun (and scary) mountain roads up there...hwy 226a holy ****...like flying down a roller coaster. Last time up there I almost took out a guy on a bike hot ******* it up the mountain when he came in my lane in one of those very tight switchbacks. A very good test of your driving skills and suspension/braking. I highly recommend trying it out if anybody is in the mountains of NC.
