2002 Supercrew 5.4L with all 4 stock cats still. It has a canned Superchips 91 octane tune and an Airaid intake.

I currently have a SI/DO cherry bomb extreme with 2.5" tailpipes and 4" tips exiting parallel to each other behind the passenger side rear tire. BORING!

I am pondering a switch to 2.5" true duals, crossover pipe, then two dynomax bullets, then exiting behind the rear tires at a 45 degree angle with 18" magnaflow rolled edge tips (yes Darren I have seen your setup...and I like it! ).

I am thinking Bullets because I want a straight through design, they are loud,...and they are relatively cheap. I have no idea whether an x-pipe or h-pipe would be better, but I know I need to balance the pipes out with one or the other. I have heard it will be louder with an H, but an X will perform better (don't really care with gives most peak HP/torque, just want it louder...which one will knock down less sound?)

I am going to set up the true duals and then if its not loud enough, I may swap in some hi-flow cats later. (I'm really not wanting to mess with the cats or headers though).

I am wondering if I will notice much difference in sound by making the switch, considering I will be retaining the stock 4 cats. Will it be louder at all then my current setup?

An increase in sound volume and deepness is my goal with the switch. I am bored with my current configuration and want true duals for the fun of it. Its my play vehicle, not a daily driver. I do realize that retaining the stock cats will still be the bottleneck of the system and hinder any performance I could achieve with going true dual. I'm ok with that as long as the sound volume/deepness improves.

I am tired of searching old threads for answers, I have been reading old posts for the last 4 hours. lol. I would appreciate a few responses to my specific scenario here. Thanks in advance for the help.

 

forgot to mention that I don't haul or tow anything. Its just a truck with a lift and 35's on it that I cruise around town in on my days off.

 

The H-pipe will be louder, but you wouldn't be able to tell with the 4 OEM cats.

 

plus the H-pipe will help in the lower RPMS

 

No it won't. That's only on Mustangs, or anything with a symmetrical exhaust system. H-pipes do not perform better than a X-pipe in any category on our trucks.

 

would the true dual setup I mentioned above be louder/deeper than my current setup, even though the 4 stock cats will be retained?

 

is this because I won't notice a difference in sound when I switch to true duals because of the stock 4 cats? Is that what you meant? Or, are you saying since I have stock 4 cats, I wouldn't be able to hear the difference between an X or H pipe?

 

Run True Duals with no mufflers and an H-Pipe. I ran this set up for the longest time on my truck with the stock cats. It had a nice deep tone and it was really not that loud.

 

Yeah, that's what I was going at. I suggest you remove the last pair of cats right from the get go. You won't need hi-flow cats if you keep your pre-cats, and they sound just as good.

 

ok, thanks for the clarification there. I called some local muffler shops and none of them will touch my cats. They all said they could true dual it for me if I brought in the x-pipe, mufflers, tips, I want etc...but they could not remove cats and they would not replace them "hi-flows" because that is not what they were equipped with from the factory.

So, for now...I am going to have them true dual it with an x-pipe, bullets, and the 18" maggie tips and see how that sounds with the stock 4 cats. If I dont' like it, I will find a local person who will weld in hi-flows or remove the back two cats on the sly. It's just that the shops around here won't do that apparently. boooooo!!!! lol.

 

Drizzle-where in stl are you? I live in fenton and there is some muffler shops in jeff co. that may touch your cats I have to check w/ a bud of mine but he had it done on his colorado.

 

im in St. Peters in St. Charles County

 

why run mufflers?

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=1UbkX_LJAI4

 

Straights are best sounding on the '97 - '03 4 cat systems, but the Bullets will make a much clearer, deeper tone.

 

but it will be louder than my current setup? even if I keep all 4 stock cats? I just want some assurance that it will bump up the volume/deepness at least a little before I pull the trigger on the true dual purchase.

Oh, and I called the shop that's installing and they said they wouldn't do it unless I ran mufflers. Bullets are ok, but straight pipe is not cool with them unfortunately. They said it won't pass inspection that way. Boooo!!! Oh well, I kinda want the bullets anyway to give it a deeper tone.

thanks