Exhaust knackered

[J Henderson]

So, it appears the exhaust on my car is not long for this World.

For the past few weeks, it has been sounding a bit more throaty during cold-starts, but otherwise quite normal once idle speed stabilised, or once on the move.

But today, I got out to retrieve something from the boot with the engine still running, and I could clearly hear that distinctive blown exhaust sound emanating from roughly the middle of the car.

This would tally up with the advisory I was given at the last MOT test.

Central Exhaust has a minor leak of exhaust gases Leak at centre silencer (6.1.2 (a))

I haven't been under the car to have a proper look, but assuming the rear section and the rest of the pipework is fine, I think I'll try and find someone that'll cut the silencer off and weld in a straight pipe. The so-called "Resonator delete" that seems popular across the pond.

Has anyone done this? I've seen a couple of vids on YouTube that suggest it won't be much louder than stock.

[Linas.P]

If you keep rear silencers original then it won't make it much louder. Basically, resonator is there not to reduce the sound to to reduce certain sequences which causes droning at certain speeds. The silencers at the back are what reduces the sound.

So if you want more noise, but not drone, then keep the middle resonator and replace the rear silencers instead. Or remove all of them if you looking to make it antisocial... Straight piped IS250 actually sounds quite good, just not for everyone I guess. 

[J Henderson]

So, I finally got around to getting this fixed.

The leak was just infont of the centre silencer, where the reinforcement plate joins the pipe. The plate itself was also starting to come loose.

Doesn't look the cleanest of repairs, but the person who did the welding was reluctant to split the system to get better access.

The main thing is that the exhaust is nice and quiet again, and shouldn't be an issue at next month's MOT. 🙂