After a never ending battle with leaks I decided to go overkill and get some Dynatech V clamps from summit. I took it to Childs Performance Exhaust in Montgomery, AL and had them fit these onto the back of my headers. In addition to this I also had them install a Flowmaster 4" merge in the place of my pacesetter merge. The bends are all mandrel (they had sections of prefabbed mandrel bends on the shelf that they used) and the fit and welds are excellent. It reduces to a 3" pipe to mate up to my hooker catback... for now.
I lost a very tiny bit of bottom end with this free flower, but it really opened up in the mid and top end. Plus, the best part is that the rasp was virtually eliminated. Now its just clean, deep, leak free exhaust.
My next visit will be to weld in an O2 bung so I can hook up HP tuners to a wideband, and to put in a 4" QTP cutout. I would love to come across a 4" mufflex exhaust.
Here are some pics of the clearance. Eat your heart out catted y! In the history of this pacesetter Y pipe I have scrapped ONCE... and I drive it like I'm running from the hazzard police.
Under the 4" merge
The can blew over but you get the idea...
If anyone is considering a pacesetter Y pipe then I HIGHLY recommend having this $55 merge installed. It is well worth it for both sound and flow. Here are some pics of how bad the merge is on a pacesetter Y:
This ladies and gentlemen, is the heart of a little phenomenon I like to call rasp. All that extra material plus the angle in which the exhaust comes together makes for a terrible merge. Pacesetter needs to have some pride in their products and at least trim the hole a little bigger.
This is what a flowmaster merge looks like:
Sound Clip is coming soon!
Good shit man. I should've done V-bands while my whole setup was taken apart, but funds were tight and my band clamps have been ok. Awaiting vids :drink:
Yeah, the first V bands that I had welded on yesterday were the wrong kind... I didnt know that even existed. I got some Nelson V clamps from a local Volvo truck shop and thought that I would do some good by buying locally and getting them a little cheaper than summit... well they leaked like crazy. The counter men had no clue, and since I had never dealt with V clamps before I was none the wiser. I put the two pipes together and fit the clamp over the flanges and viola.... a perfectly bad combination. Evidently I had two of the same ends together, where I should have had a different style flange on the opposite side.
This is the BAD kind of V clamp:
I honestly don't know why I havent heard more about them around here. They are the ultimate connector! One 1/2 inch bolt undoes them, they make exhaust parts extremely easy to work on, NO gaskets, they absolutely will not leak, good clearance, and they cost about $40 something each. I paid $99 to have a pair of them shipped to my door. If you want to make sure that it isnt going to leak then this is the way to do it!
I honestly don't know why I havent heard more about them around here. They are the ultimate connector! One 1/2 inch bolt undoes them, they make exhaust parts extremely easy to work on, NO gaskests, they absolutely will not leak, good clearance, and they cost about $40 something each. I paid $99 to have a pair of them shipped to my door. If you want to make sure that it isnt going to leak then this is the way to do it!
I hate how much they cost but i hate the sound of exhaust leaks even more!
Band clamps are what, like $15 bucks each? What I would recommend is buying them, and waiting until you have to go to the exhaust shop to do something else, and then have them welded in then for a fraction of the cost.
Now that I have the exhaust leak situation under control, I need to figure out how to clean all the nastiness out from under my car. I would probably gain a few MPH in the 1/4 just from the weight that would wash off from the underside of my car.
I've been running my hooker exhaust without tailpipes for quite some time now. Is there anything that I need to be concerned with? Several people have come and told me that I need to have the exhaust pointed away from the car. Its been this way for about 8 months. Nothing has happened. What are they talking about?
Fumes leaking into the cabin and killing you,maybe?LOL If you are parked ideling for a long time and there is no wind to carry away the fumes,you don,t want the exhaust exiting under the car.
i did this also. best thing ive ever done. i also put one in the back of the i pipe so dropping the whole y pipe takes me 5 mins. including jacking the car up
__________________ 99 SS M6 416 LS3 / TFS 215'S / FAST 90/90 / DANA 60 / NITROUS DAVES 90MM PLATE 527 RWHP/ 496 RWTQ 733 RWHP/ 783 RWTQ on the nitrous
9.91@141 N2O / 10.78@128 NA GMHTP feature car Nov. 09' www.fquick.com/ls2bait
i made the y pipe myself with a buddy of mine. hes an incredible welder and im an anal bastard so it works out nicely. the car gets cleaned underneath usually every other week. i just throw it on the lift and start wiping it down. pretty easy to maintain that way. only about 10 min each time.
__________________ 99 SS M6 416 LS3 / TFS 215'S / FAST 90/90 / DANA 60 / NITROUS DAVES 90MM PLATE 527 RWHP/ 496 RWTQ 733 RWHP/ 783 RWTQ on the nitrous
9.91@141 N2O / 10.78@128 NA GMHTP feature car Nov. 09' www.fquick.com/ls2bait
4" Merge on a PaceSetter ORY with Pics 
