Exhaust Woes

[vanagonforever]

It is time for a new exhaust system. In addition to a giant hole in my tail pipe, this weekend I managed to crack the exhaust pipe about two inches from the engine block and am spewing hot gas into my engine compartment. The rest of the system looks as if I could destroy it with a well sharpened pencil so I'm considering a complete replacement.

I could just replace the damaged parts but that would be around $120 plus shipping and I'll almost certainly need some more parts in the not so distant future. I could just replace the pipes for around $300 with shipping but I'm almost certain my cat and muffler are not doing their jobs well due to the rattling sound I hear from them periodically. I also care about what sort of crap I am spewing into the environment and would like to at least meet the woefully inadequate federal emmissions levels so I'm thinking I'll just do a full replacement.

Which brings me to the point of this post. I'm leaning towards buying the full replacement kit from van-cafe. Is there a better option out there?
_________________
1986 2WD 2.1L WBX Vanagon Weekender
1983.5 1.9L WBX Vanagon Westfalia

[Terry Kay]

<<Which brings me to the point of this post. I'm leaning towards buying the full replacement kit from van-cafe. Is there a better option out there?>>

Keep leaning toward's the Van Cafe if you are interested in getting the right parts the first time, and not waiting a lifetime to get them delivered.

DO NOT JIP THE JOB, by just replacing what has holes in it now--
You'll be kicking yourself in the butt sometime in the near future for not doing it all at once.

How many times do you want to be eating rust, and having it falling your eyeballs & ears?

One time per vehicle is plenty for me--




_________________
T.K.

[sagebus]

I am very happy with the complete exhaust system I got from the Bus Depot. The Exhaust manifold pipes and the collector pipe are Danish and the Muffler was made in Israel, Go figure. My cat was still good so I did not need a new one. The kit included all the gaskets and tail pipe. Everything fit well and appears to be of good quality. Do yourself a favor and use stainless steel bolts, wavy washers, and the Copper lock nuts. Also the high temp. copper anti-seize is a good thing to have on hand. You can't beat the price on the Nut and bolt kit the Van-Cafe offers, much less than the local hardware store, plus it has the copper nuts that can be so hard to come by in my area. Replaced my water pump and thermostat along with the two short coolant hoses as everything was so easy to get to with all the exhaust out of the way.Took some time and cleaned up the heat shield and painted it with some high-temp red paint. Looks good, sounds great ! Have fun and enjoy the quiet. Stealth Bus...
_________________
1984 Vanagon GL, Wolfsburg Westy 1.9 ltr

[tencentlife]

Header, baby!
_________________
Shop for unique Vanagon accessories at the Vanistan shop:
https://intrepidoverland.com/vanistan/

Please don't PM here, I will not reply.

Experience is kryptonite to doctrine.

[kshbaja]

just a few weeks ago i was in the same position as you and went with the full kit from van cafe. i opted to take it to a muffler shop to have the exhaust stud nuts/bolts loosened/removed as they were in bad shape and i don't have a torch. the kit was great and went together easily. its not a hard job, just takes a while. i would recommend it. i can't imagine trying to piece new parts into the old.

[mhav]

I recently blew a muffler gasket which upon further investigation I found pin holes in my heater boxes. This turned into me ordering new heaterboxes, muffler and tailpipe from vanagain. I figure I won't have to do this ever again.