I'm thinking about replacing my exhaust from the cats back because my heat shields are rusted and rattling on the exhaust tubes.

Dynomax makes a cheap cat back and Gibson makes a nicer stainless one. Or piece together a walker system, I do like their stainless "quietflo" mufflers. Any recommenadions? I tow a boat and I don't want any drone or resonation in the cab under load.

I had a magnaflow on my prior V8 4runner and it was terrible while towing, I had to replace it with a Walker quietflo- and that fixed that problem.

 

Check out one of our stainless steel VT muffler, it is a drone-free muffler.


DynoMax® VT® Mufflers - DynoMax® Performance Exhaust


Also our systems are on rebate until the end of June too.

Good luck!

 

I would cut the heat shields off. You don't need them anyway. The OE exhaust is pretty good on your year really. My 04' has been without heat shields for years now.

If you still want to go with a catback take a look at the Flowmaster Force II catback in 409 stainless. It routes in the stock location and the stainless version comes with much better quality hardware than the aluminized version. I have been running them for over 5 years now and I put one on my dads truck too. We both tow. The FM70BB2 is a pretty big muffler with quite a bit of capacity and anti drone chambers. It handles our V10s well which can sound more annoying than the 5.4l. Auto Anything usually has the best prices, I ordered all mine from there.
I believe part # 817422 fits your truck.

Flowmaster Cat Back Exhaust Systems - 760+ Reviews on Loud Flowmaster American Thunder, Force II, dBX & Pro Series Stainless Steel Dual Exhaust Kits

 

Thanks for the input. I'll cut the shield first, that flow master wouldn't replace the section of troubled pipe anyway. Might leave muffler stock. Like you said, it's a pretty high flow 3" system stock.

 

My 06 f250 5.4 had a brutal buzzing vibrating that i thought was heat shields till i took them off and the noise was still there.. Turned out to be the baffles in the muffler fell apart.. everything looked great from the outside still, this was this spring 04/2014

 

i was going to reccomend leaving the adequate OE 3" system intact too. did that on my old 5.4 SD and just swapped the cat and muffler out for higher flowing magnaflow units, along with a 4" tip and it sounded pretty nice. had a very slight drone while towing my loaded down high-profile 24' toy hauler, but wasn't obnoxious or annyoing.

 

I would recommend this as well the 3" factory piping is sufficient with the resonator. Any small mufflers ( needing an extension pipe to fill the gap) are going to drone. My flowpath Mac muffler drones at 2000-2200rpm but it's rarely an issue and much better compared to other mufflers I've had/heard

 

His year truck may have a 3.5" tailpipe. The 6.8l of that year did.