hey, im new here and was wonder for my 2002 mercury cougar what exhaust i should look into. i have been to creative compacts and other sites. I have heard only bad things about Weapon R or Weapon Rice as my friends and i call it. What are some good options for a cat back system and test pipe besides flow master? thanks for the help! any other types of mod suggestions would be great too!

If you are looking to go cat back...look up Tru Bendz. They offer name brand mufflers with custom bent tubing. The y offer Borla, Flow, and Magnaflow. All about the same price, which is not very expensive. They offer full stainless kits and aluminized kits. They also sell test pipes and hi flow cats.

http://trubendz.com/home.asp?producttyp ... type=main7

Hope this helps.

I am running the full stainless Magnaflow system, single muffler dual tailpipes. The kit was a direct replacement, only required an additional hanger for the passenger side tip.

DO not order form crative compacts (formaly custom cougars)
you will be waiting forever to get the product. that is if you ever do get the product.

they have horable customer service as well. ask just about any person on here that has delt with them, and you will get the same answer.

yea thanks for the replys guys!

On my old car, I just went to the local muffler man, and had them cut off my stock pipe and fit up 2.5" all the way back to an aftermarket muffler. And that only costed me something like $120. What would be the advantage to buying one of these kits (obviously the stainless would cost a little more) over just having the local shop do it. It's cheaper, plus they do the labor. I mean, not all of the kits are stainless, but they all seem a lot more expensive than just having it done. The kits are mandrel bent. Muffler shop doesn't do that I don't think. How much of a difference is that going to make on a n/a engine though? It still seems like it would flow a lot more volume than the stock pipes, even if the bends aren't mandrel. Someone that knows more about this than me better post up!! haha

i dunno.. i love the sound of flowmaster and i have a flowmaster series 40 muffler and 2.5 trubends pip and i love it i wouldnt ant it any other way and i love the way the pipes lookin in the back. wit the stainless steel tips it looks real nice :)

how much did that cost? I'm just saying that the muffler shop could do the same thing, and the same tips, and even the same muffler for probably $180-$220 ish. Basically, my question is, are the mandrel bends worth it for a n/a car?

Mandrel bends are ALWAYS worth it. I priced a local shop (with my connections) and a custom exhaust was still upwards of $200 even with crush bends -- not worth it. I ended up with a fully custom cat-back 3" exhaust, with flowmaster 40 series, and nice big chrome tips for about $350. Definately like the growl it gave compared to the Weapon-Rice stuff.

E1

it was 350 for pipes from trubendz and 100 install but u could install it or have a buddy do it

or do what i did. just take the exhaust off a svt contour.

i like that idea too. Duals, and those probably yield any hp gains that you're going to see, but still a relatively quiet setup.

MagnaFlow here, sound Awesome. Mine is a CTA MotorSports set up, with Magnaflow Cat and a resonator. I then modified it myself for dual exits.

http://www.ctamotorsports.com/

There Canadian so they might be a bit cheaper too.

I also went with the MagnaFlo setup, except I do not have any resonators...very loud setup. I really like it though.

Forgot to mention that I have a dual exhaust setup, as well, and after seeing how everyone else has their duals, I like my setup the best. ;) (It hides a lot of the crap you normally see under the car, and removes a few strange bends.)

E1

I custom did mine as well how did you do yours?

Do you have pic(s)?

s.wilson@acd.net if they're not hosted

Nope, no good pics of the exhaust itself, and not possible to go take some since I haven't even seen my car for a few weeks. =(

Next time I'm at the shop I'll try and snap a few while its on the lift, tho.

E1

heres mine but i think mines just the normal..