Maybe I'm just hard to please...

As a couple diffrent people suggested to me, I cut the stock muffler off my 95 F-150... Now, the exhaust just travels through the two cats, the tone, and increase in horsepower is nice, but its a little too loud for my tastes...

I guess my two options are soundproofing the cab of the truck (which I'd like to do, but for dirt cheap... any good ideas?), and re-installing a muffler, right?

Sometime in the future I want to replace the catalic converters, as I'm almost sure they're originals, and probably clogged, at least a little... Also heard its a good idea to run a pipe off the cats, rather than just let them hang alone... That a good idea? Will any of this help quiet down the truck a little?

Thanks, I know I'm a novice at everything......

 

Put a small performance muffle on there and you should be good to go.
I know I just saw 1 new Magnaflow muffle for sale somewhere,,I'll see if I can find it for ya.

 

The Flowtech Raptor has a great sound and is not overly loud for $25. I am totally satisfied with my Raptor.

 

Yeah, get a good performance muffler, that will take it down a few notches without reducing the performance. As far as the cats, take it from someone who sells them for a living. If they are working just fine, leave them alone. So long as you keep your trucked tuned up, they will not clog up, and should continue to work correctly. replace the O2 sensor every 50,000 miles, and at the same time, do the plugs and wires. Deal with any other issues as they come along. Run your cats, till something happens and they do fail. Why would someone who specializes in selling converters tell you to do that? Because experience has taught me that by themselves, high flow cats will not give you any gains in performance unless your OEM ones were actually defective. The very fact that you gained performance removing the muffler tells me that cats are not the choke point, the muffler was. Replacing the cats in my opinion would be a waste of time, money, and durability. Yes, the OEM cats are designed to last at least 80,000 miles. Most of the aftermarket high flows are only designed to last 25,000 miles. Anything you get beyond 50,000 miles is borrowed time. There are exceptions, but the leading brand is just as bad, and by leading brand, yes, I mean the first name that pops into your head.

 

Are there any other ways to tell if a catalic converter is bad?

Also, is there a good way to educate myself on the diffrent models of mufflers and how they'll perform, and sound on my truck? I'm a bit of a novice, and don't really know all the diffrences between all these brands and models...

 

Also you definately want to get something on there and put on a good hanger, because if those cats are just hanging there, your either going to break your engine pipes, your front cat or if the flanges are a little weak, the engine pipe can pull through and you'll have big expensive problems

 

Hangars are $3 at the auto parts store. You can rig something up. I even use heavy stranded copper cable (the kind they use to ground your household electric service, as hanger. Tough and lasts forever. Easy to rig a hangar. Not the best but in a pinch.

Listen to a Flowtech Raptor on a 300 six.

 

This is the best place to here different sounding mufflers!
http://youtube.com/results?search_qu...&search=Search
This one is all Ford trucks!

http://youtube.com/results?search_qu...&search=Search

 

If you like magnaflow, you can go to their website and they have a "hear it" button, I haven't done it myself but my magna flow rep told me it's there.

 

you could also try the cherry bomb or imco extreme muffler (the same thing). they are like 70 bucks alot cheaper than a magnaflow

 

I found the one I saw for sale. Don't know if he still has it or not.
#30115 close to the bottom.
http://www.f150online.com/classifieds/view.cfm