I've made the leap from wagon lurker to wagon owner

I've been looking forward to replacing the exhaust on the wagon for a while. It hasn't risen to the top of the list of importance so I've just been doing planning and researching.

As usual, my wagon decides what it wants and when it gets it. A hanger on the drivers side tailpipe broke some time ago and the previous owner must have caught that hang-down tailpipe on something and loosened the intake pipe on the drivers-side muffler. I've been tuning it out but it's been getting steadily louder for some time. Last week it started to get raspy enough that it was pretty obvious that the volume level wasn't by design and was actually a hole somewhere. I adjusted my priorities and went ahead with the exhaust replacement. I found a guy in town who does brakes and exhaust and was the only guy with a listing for custom exhaust. I told him what I wanted and he agreed to tackle the wagon the next morning. I had planned on 2-1/4" pipe and a pair of Flowmaster 40's. Pete recommended Magnaflow's based on my description of how I wanted it to sound so I went with his judgement. I desperately wanted the long rectangular exhaust tips that he had on hand. They were best suited for rear exit as they just didn't look right at the sides of the car. Fortunately I read the recent exhaust thread on the forum here and opted to keep the exhaust exiting at the side to stop CO from building up in my back window. I went with a set of oval chrome tips instead.
They were double ported but I had him cut it up and use one port on each side.

I can recommend Pete's Exhaust to anyone in my area looking for a good pipe man he's pretty no-nonsense and really couldn't care much for what his customers think of him but he did a great job and did it really fast. He had no problems with me wandering in and around the car as long as I didn't get in his way so I took a few pics.

 

Nice work, for Pete's sake!

 

I shot a few video clips of my new exhaust both to help me decide what it sounded like and to share with anyone doing some exhaust shopping.

Just to clarify. This is an LT1 wagon with no engine mods other than having had the homebase resonator removed. The mufflers have been replaced with Magnaflows, 2-1/4" pipe used from the mufflers back with 3" chrome tips.

Startup
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CrG7f7z-o-w

Driveoff (I left this video a little longer as you can hear the car round the corner at the end of the vid)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=eYX0k8gN4i0

Drive-By 01(Light on the Throttle)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=S2fH_KSG-QA

Drive-By 02(Heavy Throttle)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3T-mZsADrrk

Parking
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=prvsBrzAmtE

 

Has a deeper sound than the FM's. I like it. Pretty loud, though if you don't like loud. How about highway hum inside the car at certain speeds?

 

It is loud but only when you're accelerating pretty aggressively or traveling at highway speeds. Just tooling around town, it's perfect. When I really goose it or get it up past city speeds it's quite noisy inside. Part of the reason I did the video's was to hear what it's like from outside. I find the sound a bit much inside when accelerating and traveling at highway speed. I think I'll get used to it though as it's not unbearably loud.

 

I had FM's on the Safari for about a month and realized that they were just too loud. We swapped on Magnaflows and the sound level dropped substantially inside the car. With the FM's we could hardly hear each other talking at normal levels in the car, with the MF's we can talk normally without issue.

Nice exhaust system you ended up with. Congrats.

 

Nora is wearing a pair of FlowMaster DeltaFlows, and my last 78 had a pair of Dynaflows. Normal conversation is possible with either set of mufflers. Keep in mind, there is no overdrive in Nora yet, so the revs are pretty high on the freeways. It doesn't help the quiet, either, that Nora is wearing a pair of long tube Hooker headers. What really helps cut the noise, as well as increasing performance and fuel economy, is having an X cross over. Really did lower the decibels. The other 78, with the Dynaflows, had an H, and that helped as well.

 

I bedded the wagon down in the garage for the winter a few weeks ago and have been missing it. The weather today was pretty mild so I had to dig it out for one last mission. I've been wanting to bring home a tree on the roof since buying the wagon. Last year I forgot my straps and had to bring the tree home in the back of the wagon but this year everything fell together. It was a little too cold to repair the rubber trim strip that came off before I parked it for the winter so I just polished up the rims and pretended that I didn't know the trim was missing.

 

WOW....the wagon looks pristine, wiz! Nice job on the wheels and the rest of that car....looks really great!
Nice you could get your wagon out and tree shop. Unfortunately, mine is stored away in a warehouse so it's not easy to get at. The pipes have steel wool in them, the battery is out and it's full of dryer sheets anyway.

 

Yep! It looks spectacular in the dark from 30 feet away.I realize I'm a bit of perfectionist but it's still got a long way to go before I'll consider it pristine.

 

Hey, that tree isn't decorated

Great pictures, your car is very pretty.

 

I'm looking forward to doing the 'tree' think with the Safari next year. We've got a fake tree up this year and have decided to buy a real tree every other year.

 

I found this little beauty on eBay a while back. I eyeballed it for a month or two before making my decision. We're not allowed to drive here without plates on the front and back but it'll be perfect to put on for car shows.

 

WooHoo! My Buick just passed it's emissions test on the first try!

For those of you who've not been following this thread, that's a big deal!

However...it's not that extraordinary when you realize that my wagon traditionally fails the NOX test each year and the Province of Ontario has decided to no longer test for NOX on pre-1996 cars. I realize it's not helping the environment any but I'll take any win that I can get for now.

Tomorrow the Grand Marquis goes in to have the fuel tank dropped to figure out why I'm getting an Emissions System error code. With best of luck I'll have it all done in time before my plates expire.

 

Great news Wiz! Enjoy cruising that bad boy, and good luck with the Marquis!