Custom Exhaust Systems - Exhausted

For any welding you do off the car, it's a good idea to use (or make) some type of jig to keep the two pieces of tubing better aligned. A length of angle iron welded to a couple pieces of heavy flat strap seemed to work perfectly here.

Once the primary section was securely tack-welded together (no final welding will be done till the entire system's done), it was re-installed onto the header. Working off the transmission crossmember, the glasspack was mocked up with a 1/2-inch spacer beneath. Despite the body being off, the maximum height of the exhaust was gauged off the top of the framerail.

With the glasspack in place and leveled, it was tack-welded in place. And due to their weight, we'll make up isolator mounting brackets to fasten them to the tranny crossmember, which will prevent sagging but also keep the mufflers from rattling on the frame.

While the passenger side only required navigating the starter (which wasn't an issue due to it being a compact Powermaster high-torque unit), the driver side had a couple obstacles that we had to work "around"-the steering shaft and frame-mounted brake pedal setup.

With both sides done (tacked) up to the glasspacks, the section between the rearend and the mufflers could be tackled. But, as previously mentioned, instead of continuing in the same direction, we stopped here and concentrated on the kickups over the rearend first, then connecting it to the front section. This way, we had the ability to adjust the side-to-side angles of the kickups, not just forward or backward.

Even though you'll never see it once the body's on, we took the time to mirror the left and right radii-for the same reason that we'll eventually finish off all the welds prior to powdercoating ... just because we could!