The Dude Abides

I would think the sheer bulk of the thing would make it expensive. Its quite large.

That would be great and i appreciate it but shipping would be expensive on that with the cat converter on it. Its pretty heavy isnt it. And thats the delema on which one would cost more money. Honestly this is the 1st time ive really looked at these pipes and theyve had soem exhaust trouble before in the past. Which is why i think it would be best to start with the other 4 holes and be done with it. But if you have it and your not useing it you could just hack off the pipe pieces i need and i can have them fab up something here with the stock y pipe i have.

Ok it will be a while before i can get pics but let me explain what happened in more detail. My father in law was kind enough to let me use his warehouse to work on my car. 1 definately need to find that oil and coolant leek but i digress. Get the car up on the ramps and go check out the exhaust. I can see im in a pickle already because im going to need to remove the skid plate and the y pipe to get at this thing. I remove all the studs being carefull and let the y pipe hang off the bracket attached to the subframe buy the mid pipe. I move the pipe out of the way and position my drill. I drill and it stops, im like WTF so i back off and drill again. Stops, so after this now im getting wet because the snow is dripping off the underside of my car because its 60 degrees in the shop which buy the way was the only amazing thing about the whole situation. Now i had all my hand tools with me but some things i didnt have. Another thing about being in my fathers inlaws warehouse is he has a ton of tools. So im like ok im doing this wrong ill get a smaller drill bit and work my way up. Put the smaller one in and it digs in and stopps. So im like WTH. I take a look and a bit of metal is sticking out so im like, this friggin thing has been helicoiled before. So i slowly turn out whats left of the helicoil out and look at it. The previous owner did a friggin number on this thing so i drill it, and im stupid and i start drilling past the threads into the bottom of the head. I dont know how far i got but dont ask. So i start thredding, during this im bumping the y pipe out of the way. So then it slips off the hanger buy the y pipe which didnt have a bolt in it and twists off smashing the exhaust down on my face. Now i have a severly fu**ed hole and my car is still going to be loud with the busted pipe. So i take a step back and look things over. Thats when i noticed that the gasket that was on there there is only the wire mesh left and there isnt much of that left. So i have a car with a busted hole, broken exhaust and no gasket to repair it. I feel like kicking the dam thing but i dont. I fire it up and reposition it in the shop where its dry since most of the snow has stopped melting. I raid my inlaws tools. Grab Jackstands, and a few other things. I finish tapping the hole which looked like poo. I run my bolt i picked up and boy did i overestimate the size. I raid yet again my inlaws bolt supply and find the shortest 7/16 bolt i can find. Its still to long so i grab a hand full of washers, I WILL LEAVE THIS SHOP UNDER ITS OWN POWER. I have no money for replacement things so i take my wifes words of advice. She says, you can cobble it together. I position the jackstands up under the y pipe to hold it up and work on putting the one good gasket but now i cant find it. It was just there for crine out loud. 20 MINUTES latter i find it slit up under the engine where i couldnt find it Grrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrrr. Ok so i put my neverseze on the bolts because i know ill be doing this again. Slide it on it fights me slide it on agian and fights me. So i bodyslam the g darn thing and then it rests where it should be. Tighten up one bolt then the other size then the other size then the oversize hole with 8 washers on it. Its holding woohoo but its still hanging because i didnt position it back on the hanger buy whats left of my exhaust. I try banging pulling moving nothing nada so i unbolt the y pipe yet again re position it on the hanger then move it bolt it which takes several several several several several times. Run the bolts back up tighten them just tight enough, then fire the engine up. It runs ok and is sealed somewhat but definately worse then before. I limp it home trying to think of my next plan. Heres what im going to do. I posted something in the Wanted for someone to cut up a y pipe and send me the flanges with 4 to 5 inches of pipe. Buy the way one of my pipes has been worked on and way oversized and unreusable. Im going to use the 4 other studs that arent used and get some new gaskets and attach them to the new studs. Get over to a muffler shop and have them reattach the new pipe to the old y pipe and maybe have them weld in a pipe to replace the mid pipe. I might replace the pipe myself then ask them to weld it up to save some bucks. But then again terrys is really reasonable and dont overcharge for simple stuff.

You takeing orders eventually.

I like terry to mick but no money. If i ever get some bucks i will see what he says. Oh and anyone local, i have had terry do a few exhaust systems on my cars and he does do awsome work. I need someone to cut the why pipe. Reconfigure it to the other 4 studs. Then reweld it to the y pipe. Then cut the mid pipe off and put a solid pipe there. Simple but probally 100 bucks.

Car might be going to the scrapyard after this one.

Not so easy GD. 1st off the hole was already helicoiled so it busted up the drill bit. I had to remove the skitplate to even thread the hole. While that was going on the exhaust fell off the hanger and ripped off the midpipe which stripped out another hole. Bolt was too long and there was nothing left of the gasket. So yea now i have no car.:-\ which is exactly what i didnt want to happen.

West Des Moines, Iowa is a ways away from you. If i ever make it to a WCSS ill half to do that.

Id love to come up and raid your parts yard.

Here ya go.

The measurements figure out to be 27 inches if you went with a 205-75-15 or a 215-75-15. You might need alittle trimming or bashing but nothing drastic. I dont know how extreme of offroading your planning on doing but check out The Beast I Drive, he has 31s or 33s and he has a lift about where your wanting. Spend lots of time in the off road section and you will see what others have done. Theres even a thread on 2010 off road vehicles so you should bet a good idea on what others are doing.

Believe me i like 14s because they fit better for the lift i want. But we dont get those tires around here your talking about, we would need to order them online. Plus 14s are cheeper then others so that is a better option for me. But again i say we just dont have the options here you guys on the coasts do.

What offset are you thinking of useing. I like the dodge d50 wheels. They tuck nicely in the wheel wells. I think the standard black and white would be fine for colors, maybe red. Some people might go for chrome because they wont need to drill through chrome. 15x5 - 15x6. I like the idea of 14s but that tire size is becomeing anchient history.

LOL well when i get my welded diff ill switch up to electric fan.

Heres something that might be beneficial for the offroader. If you see you are going into a mud pit or a water hole and you had your electric fan on a toggle switch you could just kill it until you were out that way you dont mess up the fins. Or am i alittle late on this thinking.

Yea i noticed just now on rockauto the alts for the maxima are seemingly cheeper then there subaru brotheran. Definately a great upgrade to get some of that pesky interior electrical noises at bay. Any word on how this reacts with the factory ac in place. I should just rip it out because it doesnt work. Its all there and holds pressure but not charged.

I trusted a bumper jack to much and while lifting my 89 crown victoria it started to tip forward. To bad my older brother was infront of it at the time and he dove under a work bench while the car crashed into it. Pretty lucky there. Also i was changeing the oil on this deralect car and my pop always told me if your haveing a hard time shove a screwdriver through the oilfilter and it will help twist it off. Well it didnt work out so well and i ended up shredding the oil filter and makeing it unable to start. I ended up selling it to a guy who ran it into a demo derby. Motor had a nasty rod knock so it wasnt that big of a loss.

If there is one thing i havent done is rotate the tires. And I just remembered, 1 tire is different then the rest. But its not much older then the others and tread depth is the same.

Not likely a change in tranny or rear diff. My brother knew the previous owner (a doctor) and my brother was the owner after that. As far as tires go they are all the same make and model. The tranny is 5speed single range and the rear diff is 3.9

Having mildly (real mild) offroaded my soob and generally beaten the crap out of it. The single range 4wd is enough to get you through most situations but not serious ruts, rocks, tree stumps, real slippery hills, etc etc. But starting out you should be ok. If i were you i would buy the lift first but then hold off on putting it on until you have your wheels and tires. That way you lift it, its ok then put your wheels on and your good to go. You can still do some mild offroading with your single range until you can find a dual range. Depending on what lift you get is what size tires. The 2 inch lift im getting says i can have 27 inch tires on it. Do some more checking around on the search function and you will see what others have done. Hell check out oneeye he has done many 2 inch lifts and he has lots of pictures in the threads he does. So you can compare stock to 2 inch lifted. Ben

So do i:lol:

Yes i drive it while it has the known wheel bearing issue, but this problem has just started happening. Ive had the wheel bearing problem for months. As far as fast, its a 98hp motor new its not going very fast. I rairly take it above 45mph.

Dude your 19 and you still cant drive after midnight. If thats a wisconson rule thats dumb. Oh and to keep this thread real, i prepped my junkyard toolbox. Now im ready for anything.

Yea another weekend goes by, cold rainy. Snow still all over the place. My wife laughs at me because i half to open the door to let the exhaust fumes out of the car before i get in. Probally next weekend. I think im going the all thread route because dumba** sales peple dont know when im talking about 7/16 exhaust stud.

Now tom, dont be a wimp. Lets see what your car can do, we dont have much trails around here but to get the chance to meet the imfamous McBrat and his (creation) i think you could swing it.