Can anyone recommend a stainless steel exhaust for a 110 300tdi that won't break the bank? Mine's (original mild steel) developed a couple of holes and I thought I'd replace with stainless to save doing the job more than once :-) I'll dispense with the cat at the same time.
I have always been put off SS exhausts since a mate of mine had a new RS Turbo Escort back in.... '81 IIRC They always cracked ! I think he got through 3 in as many years before going back to a regular one at a fraction of the price.
Exactly the same with a friends 90 V8. Although they replaced them under warranty he got fed up with changing them and went back to a standard system. The baffles used to keep coming loose in the centre silencer box and rattling.
I didn't know that. We looked at them, from afar, but tbh we do a lot of off-road stuff and I've gone through about three exhausts, rear [1] and middle [2] sections ... which would be a tad expensive with an SS one.
[1] The rear seems to bend behind the silencer box (not that it makes much difference sound wise.) and/or fill up with mud/slurry/s**te which solidifies and is a b'stard to clean out and/or get it's rear end closed up and folded over, which isn't oo much trouble as it usually falls off anyway .. ;)
[2] The middle seems to be affected mostly when the rear gets folded back on itself, and is squashed or similarly creased so it's nigh on impossible for Kwik-Fit [3] to fit anything.
[3] Cheapest round here for exhausts .. about £30 IIRC
On or around Fri, 16 May 2008 00:34:51 +0100, Will Wilkinson enlightened us thusly:
Definitely worth removing the cat. did that on a 300 TDi disco and it went much better :-)
personally, I've not got a problem with ordinary MS ones - they last a few years, generally, and there's usually one spot that fails and the life can be extended quite a bit with one fix. very cheap stainless ain't worth it, and good ones are expensive - but then again, I'm quite likely not to keep the vehicle all that long, myself - if you intend keeping it forever it's more likely that you'll reap the benefit of the long-lived exhaust.
I stand to be corrected, but I've always understood that where it matters, i.e. at the welds, stainless isn't - or at least it isn't' as much.
I believe the welding current (spot welding or arc/mig/tig) causes the chromium to migrate away, varying the rust-resistance properties unless it's welded very carefully. That's certainly been my experience :-( although DIY stainless welding can't be expected to be as good as mass production. I did have a repair done a while back to the Boxer's exhaust system by a chap who normally works on food-grade bulk tanks, and the quality was excellent.
T'other problem is that the difference in electrode potential accelerates corrosion in the 'weaker' metal, in this case any mild steel in contact with the stainless.
So, when you put that together with increased brittleness, stainless exhausts aren't necessarily all they're cracked-up to be!
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