mhatton222

I know this question has been asked before but this is more of a poll to the forum. I recently picked up a new Borla S Type exhaust axle back to go on my 05 coupe. Looking for some feedback from folks out there who have upgraded from the stock mufflers-

did you install the exhaust yourself or did you have it done?

if you did it yourself how difficult would you rate it (1 easy to 10 incredibly complex)?

did you have a lift or did you do it with ramps?

how long did it take you?

if you paid a shop to do it, how much did it cost you?

I am a novice mechanic and never worked on any exhausts previously, so I look forward to hear how everyone did theirs before I give it a shot or take it to a shop.

Thanks

Mark H

I had the front on Race ramps and used floor jack and stands on the rear. Biggest problem is getting the rear high enough to get the stock exhaust off. Do a search and you will find several threads on here that will help you out. I also watched a few U tube videos for some extra info. After I did all my home work it took 2.5hrs from start to finish. Good luck!!

tennblkc6

I have a full set of air tools , jack stands and a garage. I installed a set of b&b fusions and a mild to wild kit. i'd say it was a 3 for me.

11Black-GS

I had the rear end on ramps. Took me about 3 hours to do. The job is straight forward but takes patience when trying to connect everything neatly so the exhaust tips line up nicely.

Bigfoot99

The higher you can get it the better, but it can be done.

VET4LES

I did my cat back in a little over two hours. Jack stands at each wheel. I had no help and I was 75 at the time. I'm sure you can do it with no problems.

rick7913

My dealer charged me $200 to install my BB Fusions last month. I thought it was a fair price and their specialized Corvette mechanic does a great job every time he works on it.

cmonkey713

I just installed B&B Fusions last week on a friends C-6. This was an axel back install and took about four hours having issues with separating the OEM pipes and rerouting the NPP vacuum line the passenger side to get the length needed for the line. Not a hard job, you just get the rear of the car high enough to remove the OEM muffler and pipe assembly.

bhoch

Friend of mine has a lift so it was not too difficult to do with that.

As others have said. key is to get the car high enough to be able to get the OEM exhaust out. It's only a few bolts and the hardest part for us was getting the old exhaust separated from the mid-pipe.

We found that taking the mid-pipe off was also a large help in getting them separated and providing a little extra room to get the old axle back out.

Takes a while to align the tips right where YOU want them we had to be careful that they did not move even a little when we tighten them but other wise, I think it's a pretty easy mod to do if you have the ability to raise the car properly and safely and have a few tools.

I think it took us 2.5 hours and that includes the test drive, pulling back onto the lift and rechecking all bolts after being done.

beamg5

Having had nothing but good luck with their products, I purchased a Corsa X-pipe and axle-back Sport exhaust system about a week before I took delivery of my (then) brand new 2013 Grand Sport !!

Long story short: I had the parts with me, in my wife's jeep when I took delivery of my corvette. I drove down the street, about two blocks from the dealership, and had a muffler shop install it. It took them 1.5 hours to complete the job perfectly, and $120.00 for their services - I never "broke a sweat," of course.

That's the way I'd do it !!

Gary

mhatton222

Thanks for all the great feedback, exactly what I was looking for. I am leaning towards doing the install myself with an assist from neighbor who is a Navy helicopter mechanic. Will follow up with the results

400HPZ51

I put the same exhaust on a 2005. As already said, if you can get the back of the car high enough and the pipes to separate it's pretty easy.
Dropping the sway bar out of the way helps also. If you can get it on a lift it's a 30 minute job. The time I spent messing with getting the car high enough (and safe at that height) took more time than the swap.

jrose7004

I had a local muffler shop install my Corsa Sports. They charged $110.00.

Cor430vette

I installed mine on my 2008 and I installed X pipe and axel back on my 2012. All on race ramps and nothing else. Never needed to move the sway bar either you just need to twist the exhaust a special way when removing it. No reason to get it up super high. Honestly, its just pipes and bolts... hard to get it wrong if you have patience. I will admit I like working on cars so its fun for me. If you don't it can take time to get the tips to line up and you will get dirty...

duckvett

I have a friend with a lift in his garage and that makes the job quite easy. One thing I would caution you about - if your Corvette is an automatic transmission, put the trans in "neutral". This will create just enough room to pull the left (driver's) side over-axle pipe past the shift linkage.

Rebel Yell

Local muffler shop installed mine for $75. Cheap enough in my book.

mhatton222

Ok, so I installed the Borla S Type axle back yesterday. Many thanks for the knowledge shared by the forum- it all came in really handy.

I used ramps in the back and jack stands/jacks on the front. Took about 2 hours most of which was spent on pulling the OEM exhaust out. I would say install took about 20 minutes and pulling out the old unit was an hour and 40 minutes.

A few observations for anyone considering doing this themselves:

- If you have access to a lift- do it. This would make a 2 hour job a one hour or maybe 45 minute job. Really nothing that difficult here just doing it on the ground under the car on ramps/jacks increases the difficulty of everything.

- Plan on dropping the sway bar- no big deal but you will need to put some pretty serious force on the 4 bolts to break them loose.

- Plan on getting all the way up there and dropping the H pipe. And here is the point in the project where you will wish you had the car on a lift! These four bolts and brackets are a bear but once I got that pulled out everything came apart pretty easily.

- I have an automatic transmission but forgot about the tip of putting it in neutral. Might have made removing the stock cans & pipe easier as it requires some patience especially the PASSENGER side.

- I had no problem at all getting a perfect alignment on the new tips. The hangers and grommets put the exhaust in just the right position. I thought going in there would be a lot to lining these up just right but turned out not to be the case.

- Being a novice mechanic myself, I would put this at a 7 or 8 out of 10 in terms of difficulty. I would not try if you are not comfortable getting all the way up under the car on ramps and stands- gets a little spooky at times.

- With that being said, if you enjoy a challenge and like the satisfaction of doing your own work it is really worth it. The sound is AMAZING!! I wish I had done this earlier, can't believe how cool the car sounds now at start up, accelaration, and idle.

- Having no use for the old exhaust, I am going to cut off the tips and fabricate some sort of Corvette sign for my garage. Will post pics when I get it done.

Thanks again for all the shared information!