3rdGenGuy6792

Just out of curiosity, anyone here use cutouts? Manual or Electric? My car currently is running a true dual setup, no cats with flowmasters. Its pretty loud but sometimes I feel like im too used to the sound and just wish I had open headers for like an hour lol.

How would a cutout before the flowmasters sound on a 350 tpi? I saw some one summit/jegs for like $50 and theyre manual with the cable included. Seems like a good deal to me.

Anyone have any sound clips or videos of what theyd sound like? Also, is there any downsides to having them (besides going deaf)?

sedorbrian

I have a cable operated one on my jeep and its great. They leak a little bit though. But thats a pretty good deal, i got mine for around 45$

89rs305-DP

I have a manual cut out on my 305 TBI. To open mine i have to crawl under the car a little and loosen the 3 wing nuts and the plate comes right off. I personally dont think an electric one is worth the money, but thats up to you. It sounds really awesome at full throttle and at idle, but its really annoying when im just crusing. At idle, it kinda sounds like its cammed. Very little, if any power increase. But still i would defiantly recommend one. Cuz theres nothing like passing a riced-out honda with a loud chevy V8 screaming in their face haha

Verhagen82

iTrader: (1)

Hey, first of all i see your from greenbay, im from the appleton area. And just wondering, where are your cutouts located? right off of the header or back a little bit?

fast82z

iTrader: (1)

I've been using cut-outs on mine probably 5 years. Depends on how bad the rest of your exhaust is. Mine have always been good for .2 in the 1/4 or more, and anywhere from 20-40rwhp. The biggest thing is that I have a single 3" non-mandrel bent crap pipe out the back, but at least dual 3" cut-outs. Actually last year was a single 5" cut-out, and this season will be dual 3.5".

89rs305-DP

Wow you are like the third or fourth guy from northeast wisconsin ive talked to on this fourm lol cool.
My whole exhaust was done by the previous owner (borla single inlet, duel outlet, 2.5in piping), and the cut out is just after the cat. I cut my cat out, hoping to sell it for a few bucks and gain a lil hp, only to find that it was already hollowed out lol.
I dont think it matters much where you put it, but i wouldnt recommend it being too close to the headers. If its not gonna be an electric one, then it should be somewhere between the passenger front and rear tires so you can reach it easily. Since your in wisconsin and we dont have inspections, it can be before or after your cat, thats up to you. It might be illegal to have it before the cat, but im not sure. But who cares? Haha
It looks very similar to this... http://www.jegs.com/webapp/wcs/store...-1&showValue=1
Only $35 at jegs! Worth it.

IROCJoyce

iTrader: (4)

Exhaust cutouts are awesome. My car will shake your stomach as it goes by at full throttle. Not only that, it carries a monumental sound from far away that reminds me of a Saturday night at the drags. Something I always wanted and finally got one Summer 09'. I'll try to make a video on a warm day so I don't warp a valve.

I have a 3" in the y pipe before my catalytic converter that dumps on the passenger side. Its a three wing nut special from summit that doesn't leak. Although I would recommend an electric unit or cable operated just to have the freedom of opening and closing it on the fly. You also don't burn any hands...

Twin_Turbo

iTrader: (25)

Real good idea those cutouts The one that was on my car torched the underside of the carpet (and the other damage is a welded up area because the installer used a sledge to clearance the floor and broke through)



Not to mention, it's pretty sad. Usually you see those things on cars with lame smog engines and they all of a sudden think they are nascar material with the exhaust blaring....sad really.

ghettocruiser

iTrader: (4)

That melted floor isnt the cut outs fault. Its the installer's fault. Should have picked a better location, or installed a turn down to re-direct the exhaust flow. Never saw one bubble the paint on the floor...

Here's mine. I installed one because I was building a custom exhaust and figured why the heck not. My magnaflow is pretty docile at lower speeds, and its really fun to open the cut out and just make the most evil noises. Not sure what it does power wise. I installed mine just after the merge on my y-pipe.





http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KIczmy0KNSc

Im not sure if Ide install another one. When I redo my exhaust I might actually leave it out. But its fun for what it is. I used a 4th gen convertable top switch as the switch, so its nice and stealth inside. I even have my fiance trained to open it if Im goofing on the highway with someone. haha. Keeps my hands on the wheel.

J.

Twin_Turbo

iTrader: (25)

IMO, your car sounds better with the cutouts closed. Must be me but I always get a chuckle when I hear someone driving past with a cutout open..it's just too obvious that he has one.

As for the floor, sure installer fault but without the stupid cutout the problem wouldn't have been there. If you want a powerful exhaust note, build a strong engine and it will sound awesome. Smoggers will always be smoggers.

3rdGenGuy6792

Do you have any pictures of your exhaust setup? Id love to see it, it sounds interesting. Im trying to think of some exhaust ideas which have cats because my car is smelling pretty nasty without them.

ghettocruiser

iTrader: (4)

Haha...Turbo. I just went back and re-read my response and realized how arrogant my comment about the melted floor sounded. My bad...didnt mean it to come out like that.

I agree about the building a big motor and picking the right cam to make the car sound better. Honestly, its a novelty item to me. I dont really use it that often, but it has its pros. Its mostly fun. I actually dont like running it wide open really. Mostly crack it for some extra sound every so often.

My cam is a reverse split cam, and not super aggressive. Its also stock cubes. While a potent little motor, my next go around will be a 6.0 block and a cam with some more guts to it. It'll most likely be time to rethink my exhaust, and I will probably be ditching it all, including the magnaflow. Most likely go with duals and bullets. No cut outs needed for bad assery then

J.

3rdGenGuy6792

ghetto...Do you have any ideas for a nice flowing/sounding exhaust thats not gonna hurt my wallet too much? lol
I have a stock 5.7 350 TPI btw. I currently have no cats, leading to a Y-Pipe then into a dual outlet flowmaster.



Sounds good for now but I wanna add a cat or 2 to clean up the smell. Which is why I strarted this cutout thread, because I want my car loud at times too

ghettocruiser

iTrader: (4)

Well...if youre running a stock 350 TPI, you dont need anything crazy. The intake will run out of breath before you need a super free flowing exhaust.

However, cats are a good idea...Ill be burning two of them into my next y-pipe. Im going to go with random tech cats since they are free flowing and are nice and small. They are a little pricey, but you get alot for your money in my opinion.

Another spot that you want to make right is the merge. Im using a flowmaster merge because I felt it was the smoothest, best fitting merge for under our cars.

The smoother the transitions in the y-pipe and cat back the better in my opinion. You'll get a lot of mixed reviews on the flowmaster muffler. I ran one on my 305TPI and loved the sound. There are definatly better mufflers out there, but like I said, you dont really need to push THAT much air where the flowmaster would be a hinderance. Go with what sounds good to ya. Or come up with your own combination of bullets to get a unique sound. Thats what I want to do.

Can you weld? Got any buddies that can weld? Even enough to just lay some tack welds... Get yourself some J bends in whatever type of steel you want (carbon or stainless), and build yourself a y-pipe if you can. Or atleast that will keep your options open for building something that fits your application. I fyou cant finish weld it, a shop could do that for you for a decent price usually.

The more you can build, or at least mock up, yourself, the more money you'll save, and the happier you'll be with what you end up with. With a stock 350TPI though...you might not get much better than some good flowing cat(s) and a decent catback. Just isnt a need to flow that much.

Im not an exhaust guru by any means. I also havent messed with stock motors/set ups for a LONG time. So most of what I have an opinion of has to deal with LSx motors and modified set ups. So take what Ive said with a grain of salt haha.

J.

3rdGenGuy6792

Yeah I actually have a family member who is a professional welder with all his own equipment. How would I go making my own custom Y-Pipe etc?

Because I took my car to an exhaust shop to get a pricing for a cat+welding and then discovered my car originally had TWO cats, and they gave me a price of $350+tax for 2 stock replacement cats and to redo the piping.

How would I do with just one cat AFTER the Y-Pipe? The way it seems is that itll be very restricting by having 2 free flowing pipes going into a single pipe with a cat/muffler. Or am I wrong on this?

I was thinking of just redoing the piping to fix (if any) leaks and adding a cutout and cat after my Y pipe.

yevgenievich

iTrader: (4)

agree that usually there is no reason for the cutout. I ran my car after ls1 swap for some time with no exhaust but as soon as i got some time and money i put some mufflers on to make it for a stealthy thirdgen. It was fun being loud but if it has no benefit to the flow then there is no point for it. I think my camaro can benefit having no mufflers so i'm just running a set of hooker comp headers with 2" primaries and putting in boom tubes

84blacktransam

A while back I was tossing this idea around, but I didn't/don't have the money until spring to potentially do it. But of course, soon enough there is a thread on here about it!

I got a 79 350, with every mod possible without getting in the engine internals, plus a cam (the old one was shot- two whole nubs were completely worn down!). Right now it has hedman headers, into the stock y pipe, stock Cat, then the PO put on a cat-back flowmaster system. It sounds very nice. But when I heard about the cut-outs, I thought it would be kinda fun to have, some of the time. What I wanted to do was get a bigger y pipe, then have the cut-out, then a new cat, and then out the same flowmasters.

That way, it would have that deep, throaty growl with the catconverter most of the time, but then when I wanted to play I could open that thing up and it would roar. I was going to get an electric one, but I didn't know cable controlled was an option. I want to put a switch pannel where the ash tray is and have the cut out be on one of the switches...

Twin_Turbo

iTrader: (25)

No biggie, people find me abrasive all the time, I have a thick skin

ghettocruiser

iTrader: (4)

Ditto... I learned thick skin was the way to go YEARs back. Probably the only reason I even bother with internet forums anymore haha.

Couple more vids of my car. First one is a dyno pull with my cut out 100% CLOSED. The magnaflow is PLENTY loud at WOT. Its pretty quiet at part throttle, which is when I enjoy the cut out the most.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yBcoSfkAPRo

Second vid is getting onto the highway. This is how I drive with it normally. The cut out is opened abou 20%. Just a couple quick pushes of the cut out button. There is a fine line where you can actually get it so there isnt any rasp, or way less rasp anyway. Thats where I like to leave it.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=ti5L2EY7DaE

J

IROCJoyce

iTrader: (4)

Well I guess better late than never. Hope this helps.
My health was the reason for not uploading earlier.