What do you guys do for flextubes?

94mx3precidia · Post by **94mx3precidia** » October 5th, 2007, 7:56 pm

Hey, I will soon be needing a new flextube seeing as how mine is beging to frew away, What do you guys do for it? Today at work i looked at: Maramount, Bosal, And lapoint and even Dorman and they all dont carry the part i need.

Do i have to get the whole exhaust piece with the flex tube or could i just cut the old one out and weld in a new one?

What have you guys done???

Tunes67 · Post by **Tunes67** » October 5th, 2007, 8:09 pm

A lot of folks decide to just replace the system with headers which come with the flex pipe. Still others will have a exaust shop figure something out.. and in some cases.. you can buy a flex pipe (Y pipe) used off the board here. I have one left over.. but shipping to you wouldnt be cheap. If you know someone with a GS local to you that has put headers on his car.. ask him if he still has the stock Y pipe laying around. I do

Tunes67

94mx3precidia · Post by **94mx3precidia** » October 5th, 2007, 8:12 pm

ya im gunna figure something out before the winter, im not going to bend over for the dealership though. Whats the flextube really for? Just to give the exhaust system some flexibility as your turning, accelerating, and braking?

Tunes67 · Post by **Tunes67** » October 5th, 2007, 8:31 pm

More or less.. there are a lot of engine vibrations that dont get transferred through the entire exaust system because its there. It also helps keep from stressing the exhaust system as the engine rocks back and forth. Without the flexpipe.. your entire exhaust system would move front to back as your engine rocked front to back. The flex pipe helps minimize that movement.

Tunes67

94mx3precidia · Post by **94mx3precidia** » October 5th, 2007, 8:33 pm

so if i wanted to, how would i go by replacing the system with headders? were can i get these from?

Tunes67 · Post by **Tunes67** » October 5th, 2007, 8:38 pm

Headers from a Ford Probe GT or a MX-6 will bolt right up. Goto e-bay and search for Probe GT Headers.

Tunes67

Tunes67 · Post by **Tunes67** » October 5th, 2007, 8:41 pm

Your back exhaust system will need to be shortened an inch or two for it to fit.. so its not completely bolt in. But.. if you have a sawzall... You can cut out a section of pipe and put in new pipe with exhaust pipe clamps. Will work great. I know.. its what I did in my car

Granted in my case I am going to take my car in and have a complete cat back system put in place. But.. There is no reason that cant be a permanent fix if you dont feel like spending more to have a complete new exhaust system put up (it is recommeneded though).

Tunes67

94mx3precidia · Post by **94mx3precidia** » October 5th, 2007, 8:44 pm

everything from my cat back has been replaced about a month ago so the back end is all good. Ill try searching now and see what i can come up with.

94mx3precidia · Post by **94mx3precidia** » October 5th, 2007, 8:49 pm

ok so i had a look on ebay.ca for Probe GT Headers and none of them come with flex tubes, all i really need is the y pipe and thats it. Ive got a junkyard close to me with a cupple gs's in it, ill get the junkyard guy to lift the car for me and ill see what condidtion the flex is in.

Still, id prefer to get a new one.

Tunes67 · Post by **Tunes67** » October 5th, 2007, 8:56 pm

First off.. the flex pipe that comes with the headers WONT work with your stock manifolds.. it will only work with the headers. And you must be looking at something else.. cause I searched for "Probe GT Headers" and found several listings.. including these

Click Here

That clearly show the flex pipe part in the advertisement pics.

Tunes67

94mx3precidia · Post by **94mx3precidia** » October 5th, 2007, 8:59 pm

what??!! i typed in the exact same thing, did you use ebay.ca or ebay.com? I know that the probes flex wont work with the stock GS, what i meant was that i would grab another stock flexy pipe from my junkyard close to my house. Ill keep looking, thanks for your help.

94mx3precidia · Post by **94mx3precidia** » October 5th, 2007, 9:07 pm

i relized what i did wrong now, i wasnt in ebay motors......... The prices seem to be pretty low seeing as how your buying 1/3 of your exhaust system that has claimed to be tigged, ported and polished with all gaskets and bolts.

I think i will end up purchasing one of these kits( Know any good sellers??) But ill just be using the flex pipe for now untill i swap the engine to a ze then ill install the headders with some better gaskets than the ones there selling.

Yoda · Post by **Yoda** » October 6th, 2007, 11:29 am

Over the past 14 years of owning a MX-3 I've just welded in a new flex joint, installed a complete OE Y-pipe, built a mandrel bent Y- pipe and installed a beta test K8 MX-3 bolt-in header kit on my car are several of the other older MX-3'er. A couple things you should Know. The OE bellows style is a real flow restriction in the exhaust. The biggest problem is the wavy inner surface and the S.steel braided liner in most of them creates turbulance. I would upgrade to a aftermarket spiral lock type or even to a newer Protege ball and socket type flex-joint. Just doing this was good for 3-4 HP on the dyno.

Of the aftermarket replacements Bosal and Lapoint make a good product. I've actually been to LaPoints manufacturing facility. We sold the building to them when we moved our manufacturing to Pennsylvania several years ago and I just happened to be in the area and got a tour when I explained my history with the building.

The next biggest restriction is the OE Y-pipe.Years ago I had friends at a local shop make 1.75" mandrel bent copy and I welded on the Flex joint and O2 bungs and flanges.Changing the bend radii improved performance of the pipe.One thing of interest another one of the older MX-3 guy down in Toronto discovered on a dyno that the stock cast iron exhaust manifolds and a similar locally made Y-pipe actually out performed the headers he had on the car. After hearing this I when the other direction and installed the set of headers I had in a box but never bothered to install. note that the design of these header is almost identical to the "MSDS, Hotshot and the various other asian cloned PGT headers but were designed in 1996.I did 3 seperate dyno pulls weeks apart both before and after installing the headers. My results showed similar data and if anything favored the sprial lock flex-joint & mandrel bent OE Y-pipe clone with cast manifolds.

It also seems on a dyno the K series engines especially the K8 KL-ZE and the curve neck Lantis KF make more power with a short secondary MX-3 pipes on each side of the Y when compared to the stock or header KL Y-pipe. Being 6-7" shorter really hits the correct tuned length to pull more power out of the engine and the longer stock KL Y pipes seems to be tuned for more bottom end torque at the expense of HP. This was probably done because the KL was intended for a heavier sedan with an ATX. As another note about header. The dyno results for the Hurricane MX-3 K8 header posted on the Corksport website years ago and showed that there was no difference between the stock exhaust and the header as installed in Rich Harris MX-3. The Hurricane header faded from the market soon after Rich and a few other people posted dyno results.