Exhaust: What's Blowing Out Your Tailpipe?

Teddy Roosevelt believed in speaking softly and carrying a big stick. But, what's wrong with speaking loudly while carrying a big stick? Absolutely nothing. Unfortunately, the stock exhaust system on your vehicle is both muffling your ride's natural rumble and putting a choke hold on your true power potential, leaving you with a soft voice and a small stick. Here's why:

When auto manufacturers design and build cars, they cut as many corners as they can to improve their bottom line. Exhaust systems are notoriously neglected. At the factory, they use antiquated crush-bending techniques to shape the pipes, and this creates serious backpressure. What's wrong with backpressure, you ask? It creates a bottleneck in the flow of exhaust fumes out of your engine. When exhaust can't escape fast enough because of backpressure, it lingers in the cylinders and pollutes the combustion process—a lose-lose situation. Adding insult to injury, stock exhaust systems also stifle your vehicle's tone with repressive mufflers.

Luckily, there's a simple solution to clunky factory pipes: swap them out with a performance exhaust system. Aftermarket exhausts are engineered for maximum exhaust flow efficiency. Not only are they made using advanced mandrel-bending techniques to ensure an even diameter throughout the entire system, but they also come with throatier mufflers that release your motor's true growl. Most performance exhausts are what's called cat-back—in other words, they come with everything you need to replace the parts from your tailpipe up to your catalytic converter. But, if you're looking for radical power gains, you can also upgrade with performance headers and high-flow catalytic converters.

Be careful when you're shopping around—there are a number of aftermarket exhaust makers out there hoping to sell you an inferior set of pipes. This kind of an investment calls for a respectable exhaust builder, and there are plenty out there to choose from. Some of the biggest cheeses in the biz include Magnaflow, Flowmaster, Banks and Borla Exhaust. All of these manufacturers use premium materials and dyno test their creations.