Are there any side pipes for sale that DON'T eat HP?

[fordracing65]

I have the Kirkham stainless steel pipes and headers, suppose to be pretty good at not robbing hp...

[jhv48]

Call Full Throttle up in Sparks Nevada. He'll trade you pipes for a modified set. I went to a 3" internal pipe. Really woke up the engine from the previous stock 1 3/4" inside pipe.

[RICK LAKE]

mtrain2000 Bottom line is do you want to talk and have hearing from the l/s ear? The other thing is these sidepipes are for racing and not street cruising. If they could fit a 2 1/2" exhaust under the car without bottoming it out they would have. Cobra have poor headers unless stepped custom ones. Stainless also makes a different sound when running. I have 2 sets of side pipes for my car, street with mufflers and open pipe tubes with a short 3" in and out muffler. Open pipes are loud and need ear plugs after driving 5 minutes. HP different is there, 22 hp at 5,800 rpms gain with race pipes but a loss of torque of 16 ft going through the rpm range. This means about the same for loss with street pipes on the same motor but the torque was up 11pounds through the same range. This was dynoed 3 times. Bottom line you are not running the motor at 5,500 rpms all day long. Forgot to ask you, how much custom work is into your motor?? Head work, compression, intake manifold machine work, port matching gaskets?? The loss of power also depends on the motor and how well it breaths. Best answer to question of yours is to get car running and motor broken in and go to a dyno shop and have it performanced setup done. You will need to drill 2 holes in the side pipes before they go into the mufflers and check back pressure with the car running, Ideal number is about 1.5-3.0 psi at WOT. if you have this, you are not going to find a better side pipe. Your motor may like more restriction in the exhaust for more power and be quieter. Want to see the A/R ratios too, fuel and air. Get car running and dyno it. O2 sensor bungs are the easiest to install and mount and wled on the inside to not see them. They sell a basic back pressure gauge for about $30.00 or make one with a vacuum/pressure gauge and orange rubber hose that will not melt from exhaust temps and run car around the block and on the highway and watch the numbers on the gauge. Good luck Rick l.