Got my 200-cell cat downpipe for the Volvo from VAST. Pre-sale experience was great - he answered all of my questions and concerns about fitment and timeline. Once purchased kept me up to date on when it would arrive and got it to me in a timely manner.
The craftsmanship is excellent. What I like most though is that, unlike the factory downpipe, it keeps the catalytic converter away from the driveshaft center bearing, eliminating the problem with heat damage to the bearing. Another nice feature is being two-piece which makes servicing the driveshaft a breeze.
Didn't run into any problems installing - although I was replacing the entire exhaust system so I didn't have to worry about rusted parts and was able to test-fit everything off of the car before putting it on. It did make me realize again how leaky my engine is. I'm going to have to do a lot of re-sealing this summer.
All in all I'm glad I decided to drop the money to do it and invest in the Volvo's health to keep it running nicely. It was a hefty amount to spend on a "free" car that's worth $4000 on a good day, but the driving experience is much improved and is better than going out and spending money on a new used car with it's own handful of issues. The downpipe was $750 and the rest of the exhaust components brought the total to around $1250 altogether.
I'd post a video of it on the car, but it's hard to see being underneath, and it's remarkably quiet - which is what I wanted in a daily driver.
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drill holes in it to make your car super loud and go really fast
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I got up pipe
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What's up pipe?
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Not much how bout u xD
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Aren't you like 40
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Are you inferring that my Volvo is too kickass for a 40 year old? It's okay to be jealous.
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Yeah. Why?
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I see you got the Motherlover brand cat. Very good. Next time I fiddle with exhaust I'm getting V-Band clamps. Tired
of hearing 
leaks.
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Don't know what this means
But congrats
This post rests on native land
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Did read. Kino
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Nice, did it need a tune? I know subies tend to blow up if you mess around too much with the exhaust without tuning for it.
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I didn't. I hope it doesn't need a tune lol. The rest of the exhaust is stock, it just has a little less restrictive cat on it.
With how much this engine is leaking oil i figure I might be better off just buying a new engine and doing an engine-out reseal on it before putting it in, rather than trying to do everything with the engine in the car.
It's only leaking two quarts per 5000mi, and not really dripping on the ground, but the whole engine is just absolutely coated in oil.
My main thing is remembering to check the oil frequently. Im used to the Porsche where it checks for me digitally upon every startup. I hope I didn't do any damage running it two quarts low - the oil pressure light never went on.
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(I'm assuming it's a turbo since you said downpipe)
That's the part that matters. Lots of people have blown up WRX engines like this. I know nothing about Volvos though, I've only ever owned Japanese cars. Also, if there's a cat in the up pipe, consider deleting it. On the WRX, when that cat fails it sends debris through the turbo and destroys it.
I mean if it's just a leaky gasket, then replace the gasket. If the engine is otherwise good, there's no reason to put in a new one unless it's high mileage and replacements are cheap, right? Oil leak doesn't indicate a problem per se IMO. How many miles are on the engine? Best indicator of engine health is probably to send an oil sample to blackstone labs.
tbh I just operate under the assumption that my WRX will blow up at any moment. When it does I'm doing a JDM STi swap, which will be fricking lit
.
99% chance it doesn't matter as long as you had oil pressure.
My method is to just check for a puddle under the car... I should probably check my oil more often given how many times there has been a puddle.
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No up-pipe cat, just the one on the downpipe. From what I've read it will do fine without a tune though.
Now you've got me worried about running no cats on my (non-turbo) 911.
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Probably doesn't matter on a naturally aspirated engine, but the 911 is of course much more complex than any of my cars. For example, previous owner of my Miata deleted the cat, which added a whopping 2 horsepower at most. A 911 is a completely different beast than a miata though.
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I did it because I fried a cat while trying to diagnose a bad misfire and new ones were $2k, so I just cut them open, removed the material, and welded them back together. The only difference I've noticed is it revs much faster.
If I have the budget in the spring I'll put an x-pipe with sport cats on it, but I'm unemployed so I probably won't have the budget.
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Yeah it's annoying to pay $$$ to reduce the performance of your car. I put a high flow cat on the Miata because it was a bit too loud for me, even after replacing the racing exhaust the last owner installed. Also, I felt bad spewing out unfiltered exhaust for no performance benefit.
Ironically, the last owner of my WRX also deleted the cat, but I don't want to put a high flow cat on it because it would need a retune and I probably won't be able to get it tuned without reinstalling some TGVs (which the last owner also deleted). So it will stay catless until I do my engine swap.
Based. Owning a project 911 while unemployed is peak car enthusiast.
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I have the vacuum-actuated sport exhaust, so when it's on "quiet mode" the exhaust isn't too loud without cats. The problem is something's wrong with the relay for that and it's $450 for a new relay. The actual mufflers themselves need to be replaced too. They're "stainless" but only on the outside, and one of the baffles came loose in one of them. I ended up cutting it open to re-weld the baffle, then booger-welded the exterior back together and did a really horrible job on it. Every few months I slather about $40 of JB Exhaust Weld onto it to keep it together. I feel stupid buying expensive cats just to have a booger-welded muffler hooked to them, but I've gotta do what I've gotta do and I don't have $2500 for a new muffler since I spent most of that budget on the Volvo and going to Florida next month.
No idea what a TGV is.
The 911 isn't a "project" per se - I've owned it since nearly new at 16k miles in 2012 (it's a 2004). It just needs a lot of maintenance now having 65k miles on it and I just don't have the money to do it properly. I spent $7.5k on parts this spring doing an engine-out tune up but there's still things like the exhaust, and more importantly, I have an exhaust valve leaking on one of the cylinders. I'm not sure if it's a burnt valve, a bad seat, or just carbon buildup preventing it from sealing. Wet compression leak down is like 15% on that cylinder, but dry is really bad like 35%. I'm just running it though since a head rebuild alone is $3k and that's with me doing the pulling and reinstall.
My main concern is bore-scoring - which I have a little bit - although a friend just bought one that passed a scope'd PPI and had worse than mine. I replaced everything that contributes to it except for the injectors. The OEM injectors are like $65 a piece but none are available, while the OEM ones are $350 a piece and that's just ridiculous. I only put around 5k miles per year on it so I have time to make it right before too much damage is done, but the eventual rebuild is going to cost me $15k in parts and machining alone (that's ignoring a head rebuild).
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Some BS Subaru did to meet EPA requirements.
The cost and ease of doing work on the WRX and Miata is really what keeps me from buying a Porsche. Every once in a while I flirt with the idea of buying a Cayman or an older 911, but for the amount I drive I just can't justify it. I also think working on my cars is like 80% of the enjoyment I get out of them anyway, and German engineers are fricking sadists.
Does that generation of 911 have the IMS bearing issue? That was biggest concern with the non-"Turbo S" models of that era.
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Darn, you're really mad over this, but thanks for the effort you put into typing that all out! Sadly I won't read it at all.
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LS swap when.
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Fun fact: You know PID control? Well the 02-04(?) WRX EBCS / wastegates were P controlled.
Without integral or derivative control, boost was highly unstable. So Subaru just capped the maximum wastegate position to where the car would make target boost in 5th gear. Which is why they made like 7 lbs and 10 lbs in 1st and 2nd, respectively.
They also didn't set up a table of initial wastegate positions, so the watergate would start all the way open each time you got on the throttle. You had control lag in addition to boost lag.
But they were pretty great in the snow.
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Huh, that's interesting. Mine is an '05, but I've never had it tuned because the EPA cucked pro tuners pretty hard shortly after I bought it so I don't know all that much about how they are tuned. The previous owner had already extracted as much as you can safely get out of an EJ205 anyway, so it'll stay like this until I throw in an EJ207.
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KBB might say $4k but in the real world multiply that at least by 3x. A dealer would do 5x or 6x.
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KBB is like $2k and the highest I've seen one go for was $10k but that one only had 36k miles and mine has around 140k.
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Yo, Ya comment got automatically removed cuz ya forgot ta include
This post rests on native land. Don't worry, we gotchu! We ain't gonna letcha post or comment nuttin' that don't express ya love and acceptance towards minorities. Feel free ta resubmit ya comment withThis post rests on native landincluded. This is an automated message; if ya need help, ya can message us here.Jump in the discussion.
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