Porsche Enthusiasts Club Forum

Hi All,

I have been looking around at stainless systems, and surprised at the costs for our cars. I have always had downpipe back systems on previous non porsche cars, and costs have been around £200 for a decent 2nd hand system, and £400 for a new system. Or had bespoke systems made for around £400 mark.

Apart from the usual places that advertise systems for our cars, has anyone had experience of custom built systems, or know a good source new or 2nd hand?

Thanks

You should PM Poprock, he got one made for his turbo. For my 928 I used Meerkat exhausts up here in Scotland. They were actually recommended to me by Colin McRae, and it was well worth it.

It is because our cars were made in such few numbers compared to all the other cars wanting a stainless steel system. Any manufacturer can divide the design,jigging and production costs across tens of thousands of Golf/ Clio or Focus owners. Whereas with the 944T there were only ever about 750 in the UK and there are only around 300 left now. A good exhaust might last 10 years which means there could be a total marketplace of only 30 exhausts a year.

I'm generalising with these numbers but I hope it explains it a bit

Dave Yeowart of Exhaust Craft up here in Cumbria (Whitehaven) can make anything you desire good quality and reasonable prices, he sends stuff all over the world for various race teams.

The problem with the 944 turbo is that to get good gains you really need to have the exhaust go ALL the way back to the turbo to get any gains, and the first foot of the exhaust has to go through some extremely small spaces, which makes making a decent 3.0 inch system extremely difficult to jig up, to make and not many people want to install one, let alone develop one, as it is so awkward to fit.

I tend to use Fabspeed exhausts, they are expensive until you look at having something else made to do as good a job, I have and it worked out costing me a fortune to develop, only to then find they would cost a similar amount to build as a Fabspeed item costs anyway, so development stopped and we continued recommending Fabspeed.

You can get one built to replace the entire system all the way to the short discharge pipe (the tricky to make one), but then you get the problem that many exhaust fabrication companies tend to not like working with 3.0 inch tube as standard exhaust bending machines tend to either not do a good job, or skilled operators that can make them do a good job can knock out several 2.5 inch systems for Saxo owners in the time it takes to fab up a 944 turbo system, yet the owners do not want to pay that high a price.

I even spent some time working with a company that makes custom tubes with a specific advantage over standard tube bending, and was quite excited about the possibilities, but it transpired that the cost of manufacture would have been 3 times that of a fabspeed system for only some additional but real benefit.

Having said that, if you need a new exhaust, there are plenty of places which can make you a 2.5 inch system at a reasonable price, as mentioned by the above posts.

thanks for your answers everyone. Interesting to read.

Ref the Fabspeed Jon, I have listened to a few Youtube videos, but you cannot hear how they really sound, as the noise gets distorted. I remember you showing me a system on a 944 outside your workshop, but that was on tick-over.... I'd be happy to spend money on an expensive system, but would be nice to hear a full system in action while boosting up the road.

For me sound is as much a part of the system /car as is quality / looks.

Jon, does the tailpipe have optional designs ? I'm thinking straight twin tail pipe....

p.s. do you keep systems in stock, or do you import on demand ?

thanks

I had twin 2" oval rolled and slashed tips on my longlife system on my S with them sitting between the gap in valance, very clean look. Like stock but twin and sitting slight higher.

Lets see some pics off the respray and wheels.

Hi Terry,, car is still in body shop. Hopefully have some pics by end of next week....

I rarely keep the fabspeed items in stock now, and tend to recommend customers order them direct from Fabspeed, simply because no one ever believes that the shipping and import duty costs often mean it ends up costing me in pounds which the system is advertised for in dollars, so I tend to get people to buy direct and we offer a fitting and modification service.

When I say modification, it is not a bad thing with fabspeed, but with Turbo Cabs we modify them in one way at the down pipe, and on all Euro models we modify the length of the system, as otherwise it stands out from the back of the car by wayyyy to far, a modification which could include you changing the tailpipe for an alternative design which we stock some alternatives.

However I would recommend against swapping to a twin tailpipe, as the standard back box from Fabspeed is a good one, and keeping it with a twin tailpipe would involve a Y-Peice which would be ugly and daft to do for the sake of it... The better way would be to chop out the whole back box and swap it for a one-in-two-out design with twin tailpipes mounted onto that.

On boost, around town, on motorways I can not fault the fabspeed systems, no drone on motorways, an excellent sound track with a purpouseful bassline, without resonance and yet you can hear the turbo spooling through the tailpipe as well... All without the exhaust soundling like a bi-plane (like a tuned scooby) or tinny like a Porsche switchable exhaust from Porsche.

We have fitted them to 944 Turbo's, 968 Turbo conversions and fabspeed exhausts to 930 turbo's, 996 and 997 turbos, they all sound great and really do produce power.

As I said, we do not sell them, we get no commission from fabspeed, so you can be sure these are not empty words, the fabspeed system is the best.

Just make sure you get the whole system, including the most important part, which is the turbo discharge pipe... its an expensive 30cm long part, but it is critical to performance.

WOW at £1900 for the system it would have to be really good. From memory the H&S one comes in at about £1200 with the outlet pipe and although I've had no experience off it I've read quite a few good reports.

I think the H&S system uses the standard turbo discharge pipe, which is a bit of a restriction, without changing which you may as well use a stock system. Although I could be wrong, H&S may have now added one, but from memory they just have a downpipe that terminates where the standard downpipe sits... the discharge pipe is the part which goes from where the standard downpipe bolts up to the actual turbo.

Yes, really expensive, but that money spent is the difference between 360 bhp being made easily, and 420 from a 2.5 motor with a turbo, injectors, MAF kit, DPW and and a mild intercooler running the same boost on a well used engine and without the exhaust it is difficult to break 340 to 360 BHP without spending a fortune elsewhere.

Even still, its an expensive mod to swallow, but why few cars break the 400 BHP mark.

We invested a fortune trying to jig up our own exhaust with a couple of improvements over the fabspeed, but the cost of manufacture was looking close to the cost of a fabspeed, without even recouping the development cost, just as the 944 tuning market place shrunk, so it was put on ice.

If you are lucky, and if you buy at the start of the financial year, the costs are lower, as the import quotas for car parts from the USA will not have been reached, and therefore you are only looking at VAT and HMRC/Courier admin fees.

As the OP is in the shipping business, I think he can probably get one over hear at a reduced price if it is put in a crate with a few aircraft bits

I have to say as pricey as the Fabspeed systems are they do sound lovely.

I like the Wortec on mine (I can go from louder than stock to stupidly loud (chavvy I know...), but I believe that they no longer available from them. Dansk seems to get mixed reviews it seems. Some believe they are spot on for a Turbo car, others reckon that they cause a restriction (they do whistle it seems with cars running a DPW, chips, etc.).

Phil,

It's worth giving H&S a ring they should, looking at the workshop when I had mine fitted, be able to make you what you want, they will give you also make the silencers to give you your required "noise" and tailpipes.

They are open Saturday mornings so maybe take a trip to see them.

PS. Hope your front wing is better now! The YouTube clip was scarey...

They do indeed make a discharge pipe now. I think it's a recent edition though and at the same sort of price as the Fabspeed one.

http://www.haywardandscott.com/porsche/ ... elbow.html

In my build I'm thinking about getting the discharge pipe from Fabspeed and then the rest of the system from H&S or get one made to suit. I accept that the discharge pipe is about £300 but don't think that £1600 is good value for the rest of the system.

So do you think the OP can get a few discharge pipes in with the aircraft parts

What about a price on a group buy?

Price depending I would be in 4 full system. At least discharge pipe