Hey all,

I'm new here, and, well lets face it, i know very little about performance mods. I have a 98 Integra RS, and the only performance mod I have is an AEM CAI (with the bypass valve...who knows if it even works). I drive my car a couple times a week around Houson, but twice a year I drive it from Houston to NY. Anyway, I'm thinking i want a little more power, but i'm not sure what to do.

I'm assuming that exhuast would normally be "next in line" in the standard intake/exhuast/headers combo, but that last thing i want is a really loud car. Apart from not wanting a rice rocket, I think a loud exhaust would get painfullly annoying on my 1700 mile drive that I do twice a year. I know you can get silencers, but im not sure which brands offer them, which brands are quieter, or for the most part, which brands are even good.

So I was thinking to drop a set of hearders in, and skip the whole cat back exhuast. But can the stock exhuast handle the extra flow? Which headers would you recommend getting? Which would you recommend avoiding? I've heard all different things (e.g. taht ceramic isn't very good cause it is more prone to cracking, that comptech is good, that DC isn't good enough etc), and I'm a little confused.

So yeah, I want to do something.....anything to givce it a little extra juice. What do you guys recommend? And i'm sorry taht i'm such a newb and know so little, but everyone's got to start somewhere.....thanks

 

one of the best first posts I've read in a LONG LONG TIME

personally in my opinion just adding a HEADER (there's only one on our inline 4 cyl's) to a stock exhaust most likely wont' do that much for you, there are MANY exhaust options that you can look at that wont kill you on the highway with the noise

my advice is try and listen to different exhausts on cars and find out which ones tickle your ear, if you can even handle them, or you can buy an aftermarket exhuast and add another resonator to the b piping

search for "exhaust" or similiar terms and you'll find a wealth of information on this site

I read more then I post and it REALLY helps tech knowldge

good luck

Nick

 

The header will work with your stock exhaust system, but without a high flow cat, dont expect any gains...

And once you have the cat, your factory muffler is going to crackle, and rattle like crazy

 

great, thanks for the advice. I'm currently researching a bunch of exhuasts which are rumored to be quiet. The ones on the list are currently:

RS*R ExMag (very quiet i hear)
Apex'i World Sport (but i hear power gains are small)
Greddy SP2 (quiet and powerful, but has an unreasonably large tip)
5Zigen Fireball
Tanabe Hyper Medalion
Borla? ( think this may be louder)

Anything to keep in mind while i search the site?

 

from experience... the RS*R was the quietest exhaust I have ever owned.. Granted it was on an accord, but it was damn quiet. You can also consider an ITR exhaust, a bit bigger piping, nice stockish look, and prolly some performance gains of some sort.

As much as we all mod I/H/E first, I really think we should reconsider the purpose of your car... If you dont want to sound like a ricer, and if you make a 1700 mile trip and not want a headache.. I wouldn't mod these unless you really wanted to and you had $ in your pocket.

My first purchases would be (if I had to start over) is suspension, and brakes hands down.. and some track time.

Back to your question... I would go with an ITR or an RS*R.

Andrew

 

I've got an Apex Catback Exhaust, and while it was a good 600+tools I had to replace installing it (dont ask), its surpsingly quiet in my Teg..Granted, you hit 3500+RPMs and it starts getting noisy, but on the highway you probably hold your PRM's below 3k, and there its just got a nice sound to it..IF you're still looking for exhausts..

 

hmmm i hadn't considered suspension mods......i guess i'll look into that as well

if I do decide to go with exhaust, I think i'll get the RS*R.....its a bit pricey, but i guess thats what it costs. One of the reasons why i wanted an exhaust was to fully milk the potential from my CAI. How much horsepower will the exhuast most likely gain? around 10?

as far as suspension mods go......i truly have no idea. Sway bars perhaps? those are the ones that go over the engine bay, right? what is a typical first step when you go the suspension route?

 

i have a ITR catback with a dc sports 4-2-1 header awesome sound not ricey at all a lil deeper tone than stock thats about it.

 

A'PEXi World Sport 2 is a really nice exhaust. Comptech makes nice parts, it is just they are a little bit more pricey. The whole header thing is really up to you, you could throw a header on, get a high flow cat, and find a subtle exhaust, you gotta decide how much you wanna spend and how "loud" is too loud for your liking. Search for sound clips on here. I found like 6 of different exhausts. That's how I decided which exhaust I would go with.

 

tanabe hyper is kinda loud for my taste...
im into quiet exhausts as well, but dont mind the loudness after 3.5k

i'd suggest the RS*R or the Greddy evo

 

<TABLE WIDTH="90%" CELLSPACING=0 CELLPADDING=0 ALIGN=CENTER><TR><TD>Quote, originally posted by viperrepiv &raquo;</TD></TR><TR><TD CLASS="quote">great, thanks for the advice. I'm currently researching a bunch of exhuasts which are rumored to be quiet. The ones on the list are currently:

RS*R ExMag (very quiet i hear)
Apex'i World Sport (but i hear power gains are small)
Greddy SP2 (quiet and powerful, but has an unreasonably large tip)
5Zigen Fireball &lt;-----
Tanabe Hyper Medalion &lt;------
Borla? ( think this may be louder)

Anything to keep in mind while i search the site?</TD></TR></TABLE>

those two exhausts are loud as fawk, you don't want those.

It's not about whether the stock exhaust can "handle" a header or not, the entire system only flows as much as the smallest component. So if you don't change the smallest component (something somewhere in the stock exhaust) then you're really not going to flow any more or gain anything. It'll be alot lighter, though, and not prone to that damn rattle that the stock header always ends up having.

 

it wont mess up your exhaust. your exhaust wont help your header. thats the only problem.

 

I'm going to jump in on this thread because i'm thinkin a lot of the same stuff.

Should the Tuition Fairy come and be nice to me I may eventually be in the market for some exhaust work. Everything is stock as far as exhaust is concerned right now. The stock exhaust(00 GS-R) sounds pretty damn good IMHO(i'm used to an old SOHC VTEC civic haha) and I'd be looking for power gains but I wouldn't want anything loud or a 55gal drum stickin out from under my bumper haha. I haven't really done any research in a long long time(I once was lookin for my civic 2 or so years ago), but back then I was recommended the Apex'i WS due to the fact that it looks similar to the stock muffler and it would sound similar thru most of the rev range but still get decent power gains.

What i'd be looking for now is something that look rediculous(the WS looks good IMO, huge *** tips dont...), sounds near stock sound levels at lower RPMs(Normally the highest RPM that I cruise at is around 4-4.5k) but I'd like a louder, more powerful exhaust note at the higher RPMs. I also pretty much would need stainless steel(go-go chicago winters!)

that's all I can think of now, not sure if it helps this thread at all