Where can I purchase one of these items from and how much should I be paying, will it make much of a difference to the car (already got SS Back box)

any help appreciated

Thanks, Chris

 

Try Falkland Performance Centre in Glenrothes 01592 773677. Do lots of parts at discounted prices for SIDC members. I can't remeber how much they quoted for a mid section, I think it was about £100.

You could also call Scoobysport who now do them.

 

Took my car to Scoobysport for the downpipe. Excellent performance and sounds.

They cut out the midsection cat and replaced it with a steel pipe. Excellent too!!

Only cost me £45 exchanging my midsection.

Gethin.
MY97 WRX

 

Guys, If you take out the cat pipe do you need any tuning done to compensate for the increased flow?

 

Mark,

If you cut out the centre section cat / resonator chamber (some pipes don't actually have cats!) then you'll improve the flow (in the case of a cat removal) or alter the wave pattern in the exhaust (when resonator is removed). In the case of increased flow, you don't *need* to tune the engine; it just means that if you do tune it, the potential is greater. In the case of removal of the resonator, the power / torque band will change, probably favourably considering it was tuned with a standard downpipe (which you no longer have) and now would be out of tune.

In either case, you'll get an awesome soundtrack :-)

Cheers,

Pat.

 

Thanks for the replies,

What would the removal of the cat do to the cars warranty?

What gains could I expect by just changing this rather than the down pipe as well?

Would I need to refit the cat come MOT time?

Thanks, Chris

 

Thanks for the info Pat. Now to order a stainless centre section....

 

Chris,

Removal of the centre cat should have no effect whatsoever on the car's warranty. Reason behind this is twofold....

a) it may not even be a cat, just a resonator
b) if it is a cat, it's effect is much smaller than the one in the downpipe. For Subaru to prove that an engine failure was directly caused (which they must do to decline warranty repair) by removal of the centre cat would be almost impossible.

There is little point in replacing just the centre section. The main restriction in the exhaust system is the main cat. Odds are you'de hardly notice the difference if you didn't have the downpipe done. But the combo (downpipe and centre section) is gobsmaking.

In theory, to pass your MOT you'de have to fit a cat back into the system. You could of course go to a bent MOT place or mail order an MOT. While I cannot condone the act of giving a car an MOT without a safety inspection, the fact that its emissions may be a bit high, I am quite prepared to accept, as a trade-off against the heavy-metal pollution caused by catalytic converters (which are more harmful than the emissions!).

The best of both worlds is to

a) fit an athermal plasma converter ; very effective, but not restrictive. Be prepared to pay megabucks for it, but it should last a few million miles.

b) have a centre section with an effective cat just for passing MOT... I wonder if Dave P could be persuaded to "hire" one of his rather effective centre section cats to pass MOT ? :-)

Cheers,

Pat.

 

Thanks for all the info guys,

Looks as though I'll have to go for the downpipe and centre section together and say goodbye to the warranty.

Cheers,

Chris

 

Chris,

Neither should affect your warranty... remember it's up to Subaru to prove that such modification was directly responsible for any warranty claim in order to decline warranty repair.... so if an injector failed afterwards you'de get that under warranty. If the turbo impeller disintegrated due to the higher flow (about as likely as a cow destroying your lawnmover) you might be in for a fight.

Cheers,

Pat.

 

Removal of the main cat is considered to void the engine warranty. The main cat is in the d/p.
So, just keep the old D/P and get it swapped back if something goes bang okay!

[This message has been edited by sunilp (edited 01-01-2000).]

 

Pat,

what happened at christmas, you were supposed to pop round. Never mind, Happy new year anyway.

Just a quandry. Whats all this talk about heavy metal pollution from catalytic converters.

I thought a cat was mainly porcelain with a platinum catalyst.

Since platinum is quite inert, where is the danger?

Please enlighten me.

Adam

By the way, going back to work on the 4th, give me a call before then. Will be speaking to the bloke about your amp soon, let me know what you have decided.

Going to bed now,
Goodnight all.

 

Sunil,

Didn't know that removal of the main cat voided the engine warranty... it's not actually affecting the engine just emissions (pushing out lots of environmentally unfriendly heavy metals). You may still have a case against IM if they refuse to repair under warranty. Remember what a manufacturer says doesn't necessarily coincide with your rights as a consumer :-) But you're quite right w.r.t. the old one.... KEEP IT and pop it back on if there's a problem. Much easier than going to court :-)

Adam,

Ah, yes, Christmas.... errr.... ooops... yes, I was somewhat occupied with my car in bits to fit new cabling (bi-amping) for the front doors. That's a royal pain in the neck, there's so little room to work in and I didn't want to take the doors off! Took somewhat longer than anticipated.... Anyway, Happy New Millennium!

The pollution caused by catalytic converters was obvserved, IIRC, on the areas surrounding the Autobahns in Germany, where it used to be nice and green (lots of carbon dioxide...) it became distincly worse. Initially blamed on an increase in traffic it was later discovered that the cause was heavy metal pollution :-( You just can't win.... (athermal plasma excluded?).

A cat can be many things... yes, you *can* use platinum, it acts as a catalyst for pretty much every chemical reaction. But it ain't cheap! IIRC, other substances are used for cats on car, but it's late and I can't remember which (and I could be talking out the wrong end).

Guess I must've missed you before you go back to work... sorry. As far as the amps go, I got a little bit carried away and grabbed one 4.8kW PhaseLinear power supply, a 1.2s kW PhaseLinear Bass/Mid amp and a couple of 0.6s kW (a bit of a misnomer, it's really a 1.2kW amp)Mid / Treble amps. I now have panel vibration problems :-(

Cheers,

Pat.

 

Pat,

Yeah thats what i heard re main cat. I am sure someone will prove me wrong (i hope?)

Best regards

 

Sunil,

See other post regarding cat removal in Israel... seems that across there, at least, cat removal does not void warranty. It would add weight to any case here in the UK (ie, how come us Brits can't remove it while our Israeli friends can?)

Cheers,

Pat.

 

Pat

Yeah interesting that. Oh well, GB is behind in a lot of things compared to the rest of the world and i guess this is one of them

 

Hmm....

Pat, the athermal plasma converter sounds very sexy !!! Must look that one up !
Are there any web resources pointing out the ammount of poison that cats produce?? Interesting topic....

Gethin.



[This message has been edited by Gethin (edited 04-01-2000).]