My homemade Ypipe.

s1120 · Jan 20, 2008

Well when I tore down my 95 to replace the engine I was AMAZED how BAD the stock Ypipe/cats were!!! Im suprised the motor eaven ran!!!! Tiny pipes, bad bends, and crimps..YUCK! Well not having the cash to go topline aftermarket, and having some equpiment, and a little skill, I decided to build my own pipe.

here is the stock pipe...

I started with some mandral bends, and a Flowmaster 2 into one collector....

Fireguy50 · Jan 20, 2008

thats it? just a pile of parts :goodfinge

s1120 · Jan 20, 2008

LOL!!!! Well ya... I was waiting for it to put it's self together.

s1120 · Jan 20, 2008

Decided at that time to go with 2 1/2 headpipes....

Had a day or two off during the week, and got a little time in. Had to build a adapter pipe to go down to the still good Flowmaster catback that was on the truck, and took a lot of time figuring out where the collector wanted to be. After much trial and error, I got it to a place that allowed easy pipe routing, and still enough clearance for the tranny lines. [MAN that e40d is HUGE!!!!!!!]

Started running some pipes.... Well ended up that the pass side was pretty tight between the engine, frame, starter etc. To make my life a little easer I ended up going with 2 1/4 off the header, stepped up to 2 1/2 at the collector. The driver side will still be 2 1/2. I figured with the longer pipe, and more bends, if anything it will help eaven the flow between the two banks. [that my story, and I am sticking to it.

]

gearrat · Jan 20, 2008

s1120 said:

well dont look to bad but fix that hole:duh

s1120 · Jan 20, 2008

Well no pic's yet, but the driver side, I got the mounting flange tacked to the first 90deg bend of the head pipe. Ran out of time, and have not attached it to the collector yet. More to come hopefully tonight...

Need4racin · Jan 20, 2008

Nice. My 96 is the same color combo as yours... its really looks great when its detailed.

The only good thing about the stock y pipe is its pretty durable.. good quality metal.

How much do you think your custom y pipe is going to cost, without including the price of a new high flow cat.

s1120 · Jan 21, 2008

Price??? Well not counting some parts I got, but will end up not needing....

About $40 for the collector, $8 each for the mounting flanges, 20ish each for the bends, a few other misc parts... add anouther 20 so.....a little over 100, and wayyy under 150.

s1120 · Jan 21, 2008

Thanks six!!! I will try to get a better pic of that adapter pipe.

Ya, I was working on that first bend off the header!! Im pretty close but still a little more to go. From the look of how the pipe/collector sits, I THINK I can do a nice streight into the collector.

Been pretty cold here, and I am working outside.

As for the cat... Ya, we should have one, and I will be adding one sooner or later, but for now, I just have the streight pipe. I left room for onr though.

Sixlitre · Jan 21, 2008

s1120 said:
Been pretty cold here, and I am working outside.

As for the cat... Ya, we should have one, and I will be adding one sooner or later, but for now, I just have the streight pipe. I left room for onr though.

It's tight under there alright

I'd never have been able to get this 36" Walker truck muffler under there;

If it hadn't been for the fact the single cat was only 14" long. It wouldn't have worked with the stock two cat set up, but then again none of us want to keep that uber-restrictive set up.

Heck that's why you're freezin' your nads off under your truck in Januray, right ?

Best of luck and keep up the good work. Got a protractor to show the pipes against, for angles for the fellers?

Sixlitre

A1Fiddler · Jan 21, 2008

I love not having to run cats :beer The advantages of a 28 year old truck

Nice job man, looking great so far!

Sixlitre · Jan 21, 2008

My single 3" cat is there, but..........

it's hollow:toothless As mine is over 20 and don't get sniffed no mo' :chili:

The empty cat isn't reducing flow and it's "there" for any nosey b@$turds that care to look (hope old Eddie bleeds fluids all over them:goodfinge).

Sixlitre

5LF-150 · Jan 25, 2008

loving this thread i need to do something similar to this hopefully on my own b/c i don't trust the exhaust shops around here at all, a lot of this going on :red x

Sixlitre · Jan 25, 2008

Yep s1120 is doing us all a major service by doing this step by step !

Even if you don't weld (like me, my welding brother moved 350 miles away 10 years ago, B@$turd !:banghead), you can still do this.

If you clamp or even drill and fasten each pipe, after fitting, with a sheet metal screw you'll be good enough to take it off to a welder ( my neighbour:toothless, or my mechanic buddy:toothless, or my two welder buddies:toothless).

Go s1120 go !!!!!!

Sixlitre

BigBlue 94 · Jan 25, 2008

s1120 nice work.

s1120 · Jan 25, 2008

Thanks guys!!

Havent done anything the last week. Been wicked busy, and cold. Hope to get more done this weekend!

DrDuktayp · Jan 25, 2008

A Reddy Heater does work outside. We had one blowing under my sons car and we were outside in the snow. If you have one or know someone with one it made a huge difference feeling a little heat on us.

Like seeing the merged y-pipe going in. My rigs prior exhaust had it's exaust t'd together and it looked horrible.

Keep posting pics.

Sixlitre · Jan 26, 2008

DrDuktayp said:
A Reddy Heater does work outside. We had one blowing under my sons car and we were outside in the snow. If you have one or know someone with one it made a huge difference feeling a little heat on us.

You know it

Sometimes just throwing a tarp over the vehicle and pointing the salamander underneath will retain tons of heat.

I used to close up the two car garage and fire that 30,000 BTU fans driven kerosene unit up and I could have it up to 70 degrees, from -30 in half an hour.

Now I just flick on the radiant floor heating(see pipes on top of styroam;

Now under concrete;

It's THE cat's @$$ for heat, where you want it (in the floor !).

Sixlitre

p.s./
That heater in the lower pic is 125,000 BTUs (it's my buddy's and it's thirsty !)

s1120 · Jan 26, 2008

Nice floor six!!! I sooooo want one!!!

I have a heater in my shop, but shes FULL!!!!!! With a 72LTD, a 70 Mustang, two torn apart snowblowers, and all the tools, I can barly fit myself in there!!!!! Temp is not the biggest problem though. Time is. I have a high maintance 5 year old, and a 19 month old in the house. Time is scarce!!!!

dan76 · Jan 26, 2008

copy that......my new shop is still on paper, while my old one is 1500 miles away. I just did a neighbor's brakes so he could pass state inspection in his ice covered driveway @ 15 degrees with a 20 kt wind.

s1120 · Jan 26, 2008

Well a few min of work got in. This is the left pipe. I still have to work on the angle a little. Its close, but not quite there yet. ........

Sixlitre · Jan 27, 2008

I'm likin' it s1120 !

Was I about on the money with 105 degrees off the manifold ? I'm surprised you cut and sectioned her. I'd have thought you could bend 15 degrees out of a 90 to achieve it ? Still, your's looks professional.

Try what Hoxviii uses under the old gal. Heck at 145,000 BTUs I guess he can damn the torpedoes !

If you get chance, can you hold a ruler or tape up against the pipes in the pics for everyone ?

Thanks for the new pics and good luck. I'll be out under the Town Car tomorrow tracing down a fuel smell. Got a new battery for one of them today (Broncos battery was in the Lincoln).

Sixlitre

Hoxviii · Jan 26, 2008

I'm liking it, looks like what i did to put an emergency exhaust (that became permanent) on my 300. I took half of a dual exhaust kit for a 73-87 K10 and sliced and diced it until it fit which actually took alot less work and turned out alot better than I was expecting.

and :beer to the slamander heaters. I have a 145,000 BTU unit I picked up at a rental shop that was shutting down, paid all of $50 for it :toothless

When I did my trans swap I was outside and it was about 6 degrees out, but all I had to do was point that thing in the direction of the truck from about 10' away and I couldn't work in anything more than a t-shirt :chili:

Justin

dan76 · Jan 27, 2008

Your effort continues to look good. Once you're satisfied with the slices you're cutting to move the pipe angles, are you going to do a simple butt weld for final welding? Are you placing a piece of pipe scrap behind the wide cuts to better fill the gap? What welder are you using?

s1120 · Jan 27, 2008

Just going to butt weld it. That bigger gap will be closed up whit the next cut. Ya, she was a little bit wider then I like.

As for a welder. I am using a Craftsman 110v Mig. Beed working fine, and more then enough amps for this job.

s1120 · Jan 27, 2008

six,

Ya, I was thinking that, but I could not figure out a way to bend it, and not crimp the Sh!& out of it.

Davids78Bronco · Jan 27, 2008

nice looking work. That should help power quite a bit. :beer

Sixlitre · Jan 27, 2008

It was like day and night Hemithis:thumbup

as a matter of fact when I backed her out of the shop and wooded the pedal it took off like it'd never done before and busted the tires loose going into second.

It was like someone or something was shoving it from behind(and hard). For lack of a better analogy, Eddie thought he was a Hemi for a minute there:toothless

Absolutely none of my GM buddies believe it's a 5.0 litre. They're all convinced it's a 351 (I wish).

Summit credits that Flowmaster Y section (the headpipes are welded to) with 40 ft/lbs on a 396 and I don't doubt it at all.

It made a huge difference in power & acceleration and it paid for itself in no time with a solid 3+ mpg increase in mileage. The thing climbs hills and passes cars without shifting down out of OD.

Did the same thing to my Lincoln Town Car (5.0 litre also) and it gained nearly 5 mpg almost immediately paying for itself.

Couldn't recommend it highly enough ! I didn't know anything about Bassani at the time I built it and Catco didn't have that cool twin pipe Y-pipe yet, so I was forced to build the custom one.

My pipe bending buddy liked the idea so much he's done a pile more for customers and everyone is blown away by the performance and mileage increases.

If you can improve a FSB by 3+ mpg, in some cases that's a 25%, 33% or even bigger increase.

S1120 now has the chance to take more pics and get more detail than I did, to help everybody out.

If we all put our heads together on this one we could really improve on WD-40s mouse trap and get the custom Y-pipe down to UBER-affordable and relatively easy for everyone.

I could never have done it without copying most of WD-40's system. He sent me detailed pics and coached me and my pipe bending buddy along the way.

My biggest addition to his system was using the header flanges($3.09 each J.C.Whitney) everywhere so I could remove and replace components anytime I liked.

Broncos being so high, even stock, I can crawl under and remove my whole exhaust system in minutes with two 9/16" wrenches and 5/8" deep socket on a pile of extensions.

I've had that cat off and on more than a new brides pajamas :toothless

Sixlitre

Gearmo24 · Jan 27, 2008

I should have looked in here before going nuts fabbin my Y-pipe. Im thinking on redoing it after looking at your pics S1120.
My only issue is that I installed a set of shorty headers from a 5.0 engine that were already wrapped, so my Y-pipe was way too narrow, I ended up stretching it and now I think I have less flow that I started with (I know, should have sticked with a set for a 5.8)
My question is where can I get a Y collector like yours.. I will sit down tonight and do some research. Your pics do help though.

Sixlitre · Jan 27, 2008

It's called a "Flowmaster scavenger series Y collector". Summit sells em' for about $40.00. You can get all kinds of sizes of inlets for the headpipes and all kinds of sizes of outlets.

The 2 1/4" to 3" one was 300214 IIRC

Gonna get header flanges or are you gonna update the mouse trap and use those spring loaded slip fit type connectors ?

If I were a 5.8 and only had Bassani to choose from, I'd do just like s1120 is doing !

Sixlitre

s1120 · Jan 28, 2008

Well got the driver side pipe sorted. ....

Still have to finish weld, but got the angle right.

Well camera was acting up, and the picture did not come out. My pipe angle ended up needed to be about 125 deg. Why?? Who knows. Maybe its becouse of the bigger tube????

BTW hear is the welder I am using....

Nothing fancy, but works well.

s1120 · Jan 28, 2008

Oh and as you can see my shop is TRASHED!!!!

Davids78Bronco · Jan 28, 2008

why did you use diff size pipe? Thats going to hurt your flow.... IDK how much it will matter for your application just wondering.

s1120 · Jan 28, 2008

you mean the driver side being bigger then the pas? Well the pass side was pretty snug around the block, frame, and starter, and being it was such a short run, with only a wide bend, compaired to the driver side, I figured going with 2 1/4 would help the room issue, and not realy effect flow much, or at all. Also being its a 5.0L, and eaven with the mods I have done, will probably never max out the flow.

So mostly just to make fitment a little better.

Sixlitre · Jan 28, 2008

2 1/4" is plenty for a the headpipe. Don't worry. Especially compared to the kinked, undersized, restricted headpipe that comes off the passenger manifold before heading straight into teh stock first cat.

Here's a pic of mine before I had shorties;

Both pipes were 2 1/4". Kinda illustrates s1120's point on how tight things can get around there. I actually picked up room around the starter compared to the stock Y-pipe.

Can't believe you got 2 1/2" flares to seat properly against the manifold balls. I had trouble with just 2 1/4" flares, until I went to shorties.

Sixlitre

s1120 · Jan 28, 2008

I have shorties, and they are for a 96 and sized for the bigger headpipes. Will not eaven fit on the small stock Y

Gearmo24 · Jan 28, 2008

Like I listed earlier, I had the same problem with my shorties... I ordered the Y pipe that sixlitre recommended... Im planning on using 2 pieces of heavy duty flex pipe as well, which will help me installing them, plus it might last a little longer since then the exhaust wont be as rigid.. thats my theory, will see what happens.. I will be taking some pictures after I get the piece prepped up and ready to weld.

s1120 · Jan 28, 2008

SWEEETTTT!!! What are the inlets on that monster???? 3"???

Gearmo24 · Jan 28, 2008

With a 4.5 outlet you better be driving your Bronco everyday, otherwise you will have birds and squirrels nesting there.. LoL!!

My homemade Ypipe.

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