Hi peeps, thought i would let you all know ive booked the wifes multiwagon in for a new stainless steel exhaust on friday.
After ringing around, long life, haywoods and scotts, i eventually decided to go to pipecraft in basildon. Main reason was the cost.
He has quoted me £320 for the whole system cat back - he had a look and said his best option was to cut the down pipe from the manifold fix stainless from there including flex joint (he quoted that the downpipes very rearly corrode or fail - so know i know that one will lol).

He really seemed to know his stuff, but generally deals with boy racers who want that loud boom from the tail pipe - at the price he quoted i wouldnt mind the car sounding thoaty.
Im leaving the standard cat in place as i really dont want or need any more noise from the car once its done, he has offered to put in a racing cat with all the nessary downpipes as well - which ive refused.

The tail pipes are the only things i really stuck on, im not sure wether to go for an oval, retangular or normal round pipe, all of them look about 3 inches in diameter. anyone had these fitted to the MW?
also any one had any dealings with pipecraft?

I will make a recording of the noise it makes when done and compare it to my 1.6 as well so others can hear the difference.
roy

sounds good mate, let us know how you get on, do they do proper stainless welding or just MIG? if they use mig it will corrode with time? what guarantee do they offer?

they do both mig and tig welding, the warrenty is also lifetime of the time you own the car.
im not worried too much as we plan to keep the car now and if it corrodes out then he can sort it under warrenty.

I did look at longlife - they quoted me £420 +vat but would transfere the warrenty to any new owner, i really am not bothered if i sell the car what happens to the exhaust.

I recently got a cat-back system myself with lifetime guarantee for £300. The welds looked top quality as well, though not 100% what type they did, looks like stainless to me. Anyway, this is mine...



...love the way it looks and sounds. Doesn't drone on the motorway either, which I know is a problem with just bolting on some back boxes and the like. The guy who fitted it though gave me a wide range of options, he thought a single bore may look better, but I've seen many Stilo's with a twin tailpipe and knew it suited the car, so went for it : )

Plus, the guy who did mine did the system for the Renault Avantime the Top Gear guys tried to tune up

when i put my backbox on my car it was basically a straight through, very very loud droned on motor way, so i bought a middle sectic from a 1.6 citroen xsara picasso and cut the xsara's middle box out and welded it into my centre section, gave me much better MPG, and cut the sound dramatically.

Right I really havnt looked at the exhaust system on the JTD in to much depth so off to jolly old eper I went..and found this..




Front pipe is Number two in this image Roy and if it were me in this situation I would ask him to not cut back and insert a bit of rusty pipe into the new stainless section but to do the bloomin job correctly and go right back to the flange that connects to the cat....with regards to round over oval end pipe I had no option with longlife with mine as to go oval was more cost so I naturally had the round one..lol....with the oilburners you can if you want go up in dia on the pipework with out any massive losses like can happen with the petrol's cos diesels dont need the back pressure like the petrol engines do..

not a jtd mate, but a 1.6. it was a quick cursary look yesterday.



The car was on the ground yesterday so i think he may have thought the front down pipe was a part of the cat, im gona print this pic off and give it to him on the way too work this afternoon.
I want it cat back so i will express this to him.

He hasnt said that there is any price difference between the pipe ends so i may go for the oval.
roy

I found out that this is how power flow had done my 1.6 Roy ..he chopped the pipe to the cat just below the front pipe flange and sleeved over with a pipe that had been swagged [expanded ]and then welded the new pipe to the flange leaving a section of the old pipe connected and now inside the new stainless one..lazy bugger should have cut out the old pipe from the flange cleaned it up ..made up a new front pipe and inserted it slightly into the new flange..tacked it into place after bolting flange to the cat [makes sure its lined up ] taken it back off and welded the outside of the pipe to the flange..then taken a half round file and then filed a nice chamfer back on the pipe to the flange inside ..half these guy will cut corners every which way they can if you dont watch them and they think you know sod all about exhaust manufacture..

yeah i agree, some professionals (not all) will cut corners - ive seen this time and again. the only person that ends up suffereing is the owners having to pay out twice for the same job!!
i plan to stay with him when doing the job (maybe offer an hand lol).
Thinking about it i think i would rather leave the front pipe intact than chop it if he dosent want to make one up - this could bring in a new area of weekness to the exhaust.
that pipe wont corrode anyways as the cats run so hot there is very little chance of rust penetrating.
im gona nip up there in a mo, i will try to respond to what he said from my mobile.
roy

well Roy how did you get on? any updates mate?