where to locate exhaust crossover?

Any advice on where to locate a crossover or H-pipe? Am thinking of
adding one to my car to mellow out the exhaust a little and hopefully
pick up some HP. There's a real easy spot to put one just behind the
front U-joint of the driveshaft; any farther forward would be a PITA
however. Is there a rough guideline to how far away from the engine the
H-pipe should be? FWIW this is a Studebaker 289.

Or I suppose I could just lay down some Dynamat, which would probably be
easier...

thanks,

nate

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Anyplace between the mufflers and hearders or exhaust manifold. Wherever its
convenient. It's not critical for street use where the exact placement is
as it will give you more low end torque and a quieter ride. I've thought of
going the extreme and using a single 3" exhaust from two 2 1/4" pipes for
better low end torque.

Nate Nagel wrote:

> Any advice on where to locate a crossover or H-pipe? Am thinking of
> adding one to my car to mellow out the exhaust a little and hopefully
> pick up some HP. There's a real easy spot to put one just behind the
> front U-joint of the driveshaft; any farther forward would be a PITA
> however. Is there a rough guideline to how far away from the engine the
> H-pipe should be? FWIW this is a Studebaker 289.
>
> Or I suppose I could just lay down some Dynamat, which would probably be
> easier...
>
> thanks,
>
> nate
>

On Sun, 15 Jan 2006 21:37:55 -0500, Nate Nagel >
wrote:

>Any advice on where to locate a crossover or H-pipe? Am thinking of
>adding one to my car to mellow out the exhaust a little and hopefully
>pick up some HP. There's a real easy spot to put one just behind the
>front U-joint of the driveshaft; any farther forward would be a PITA
>however. Is there a rough guideline to how far away from the engine the
>H-pipe should be? FWIW this is a Studebaker 289.
>
>Or I suppose I could just lay down some Dynamat, which would probably be
> easier...
>
>thanks,
>
>nate

The easy way, paint your head pipes, use cheap engine enamal,
go for a short drive, check where the paint's burned off, thats
the best place for the cross over...

SteveL

wrote:
> On Sun, 15 Jan 2006 21:37:55 -0500, Nate Nagel >
> wrote:
>
> >Any advice on where to locate a crossover or H-pipe? Am thinking of
> >adding one to my car to mellow out the exhaust a little and hopefully
> >pick up some HP. There's a real easy spot to put one just behind the
> >front U-joint of the driveshaft; any farther forward would be a PITA
> >however. Is there a rough guideline to how far away from the engine the
> >H-pipe should be? FWIW this is a Studebaker 289.
> >
> >Or I suppose I could just lay down some Dynamat, which would probably be
> > easier...
> >
> >thanks,
> >
> >nate
>
> The easy way, paint your head pipes, use cheap engine enamal,
> go for a short drive, check where the paint's burned off, thats
> the best place for the cross over...
>
> SteveL

I've heard that before, you mean you mount it where the paint stops
burning off?

About how far back is that, usually, for a typical V-8 engine? All the
way behind the transmission? That's the only good place I see for a
crossover. If it should be farther forward I will probably not even
bother.

Also, does anyone make a crossover kit in stainless, or am I stuck
having it custom fabricated? The ones I see in all the glossy color
catalogs that show up at my house every week all are aluminized steel,
and as I have a full stainless exhaust I would prefer to keep it that
way. Stainless makes me happy. Finally, is there any real advantage
to the new X-style crossovers as opposed to the traditional balance
tube that's just tee'd into the exhaust pipes?

thanks,

nate

I've been researching the performance increase of using a custom exhaust
system on a street car for about 30 years now. Every hot rod mag that I've
read where they build up a hot setup and add headers, bigger pipes and low
back pressure mufflers has always indicated that adding headers to a street
vehicle is a waste of money for the performance gain that you get. The car
mags will never admit though as they make a lot of money through header
advertising. They always end up lumping in the big increase in power from
headers with adding new free flow mufflers and larger pipes.

Don't get me wrong, headers do give a performance increase BUT above 4500
rpm! Below 4500 rpm is where 99% of your street driving will be and you'll
see no performance gain.

Back on topic about where to locate the exhaust crossovers. Anyplace that is
convenient between the mufflers and exhaust manifolds. Tuning the exhaust
to find the "perfect" placement may gain you 5 hp high above 4500 rpm but
you won't notice any difference for 99.9% of your driving.