|  | Topic : Gutted Cat or Cat delete options - which is better??? |  |
| | | bnz433 | | Jupiter |  |  | | Reg. Date | : | 10/06/2011 | | Posts | : | 1,843 | | Location | : | Clifton Park (Upstate), NY, United States |
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| | Posted : 08 Oct 2012 - 17:56 Post title : Gutted Cat or Cat delete options - which is better??? | | | Okay, several threads and lots of opinions. I'd asked this in a previous one, but no real answers. So I thought I'd "attempt" to collect tangible, technical comparisons of the catalytic converter delete options.
Using stock cat as baseline, what are the Torque/HP and sound benefits of:
1) With elbows to eliminate cat ($50usd)
2) With "crossover" decat pipe option ($250+usd)
3) Gutted cat (labor...$$)
I'm leaning towards mandrel bent 45deg SS elbows, but others have noted a "raspier" sound than either gutted cat or bypass pipe. Is there any technical (power/torque) gains of either bypass pipe or gutted cat over simple elbows? Does anyone have a relative audio comparison of the exhaust note of either bypass pipe or gutted cat (ie - deeper or throatier than stock cat or just elbows?)?
Really wish I had the time, cash and a savvy dyno shop nearby to try this myself, but....just closed on house, engaged and....voila, bun in the oven!!!!
Jamie
BTW - mines a 1700 Storm with high-flow filter, stock cat, and short TORS and TOR Tune.
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| | | daz | | Zeus | |  | | Reg. Date | : | 12/05/2009 | | Posts | : | 7,709 | | Location | : | United States |
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| | Posted : 08 Oct 2012 - 18:48 Post title : Re: Gutted Cat or Cat delete options - which is better??? (Re: bnz433) | | | Consider this, and i'm just relaying this not confirming it...Dizze and I believe others have said that running decat w/o a proper tune will yield a harsh tone. Since you own the storm however you CAN use his tune, and using elbows it gets quite a bit louder than with cat and I personally find the tone nice. I do wear ear plugs tho, and it also depends on what YOU think is harsh. I was very anti loud till i tried this and rode it for a week by which time i came to love it. Power with cat removed and his tune is shown on Dizze's dyno comparison as 9 Ft Lbs and 5 HP gains at 3500 RPMs over his WITH cat tune and cat installed. I can confirm that, at least it sure feels like it.
Gutting the cat depends on what you mean. if you mean removing the material then consider that a waste of time. I did that and even with that tune i noticed almost nothing in the way of sound or power. There are inner cans that block the flow and make it do a U turn sort of route, and apparently it's true that the cat material itself is not restrictive. I was told that by my mechanic. But the box itself is unless you remove those cans the material was in. I haven't done that and it seems that would be a major horror story to do.
Crossover decat....dunno, but i doubt it makes much of any kind of difference over elbows. theres already a crossover up front on the headers for one thing. I would suggest to you just get a cable for tuneECU if you don't already have one and load dizze's decat tune and grab a $5 elbow (everyone says $5 tho here they are around $6-8)and cut it in 1/2 and try it out that way. It's the quickest cheapest thing and take minutes to try and you will probably absolutely love it. i sure do. I got the elbow, cut it in half in 1 minute with a angle grinder and installed them in about 20 minutes. Total time to load tune, cut and install elbows was 30 minutes.
Also, note that if you just run the tors tune, you may be ok with the sound, but you also probably won't get an improvement in performance because the main reason a decat improves performance is that you cannot tune the bike for max power with cat installed due to the likelihood you'll ruin the cat and clog it killing the bikes power if it even runs at all. decat allows you to tune for max power as Dizze's tune is. So it'
s not just a lack of restriction that gets you the extra grunt. My understanding is that decat with out the proper tune can even cause a LOSS of power. So make sure whatever you do you get that tune in there. tuneECU is very easy to use if you haven't tried it already.
| 2010 Blue/White Thunderbird, "Brutus". 1700 kit, short tors, gutted cat, UNI filter, filter seal off, custom tune. Brutus in his native habitat: Link
| | Post edited by daz on 08 Oct 2012 - 18:52 |
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| | | brackforce | | Set | |  | | Reg. Date | : | 25/04/2010 | | Posts | : | 123 | | Location | : | Fayetteville, NC, United States |
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| | Posted : 08 Oct 2012 - 19:06 Post title : Re: Gutted Cat or Cat delete options - which is better??? (Re: bnz433) | | | I heartily concur with Daz. You can't go wrong buying the $20 cable, downloading DizzE's tune along with TuneECU, and getting the "less than $10 elbows" (I just coined that one) from Lowes or Home Depot. For less than $30 you can completely transform your bike and it's all 100% reversible. Like Daz said, it takes about 30-45 minutes total for the whole operation. If you're anything like me you will absolutely love it. It sounds and runs 150% better. If you decide to go stainless then you can order the ss pipes anytime and still be in the saddle while you wait. Switching them out takes about 15 minutes then you're only out less than 10 bucks for the hardware store tubing, which would be worth the trouble for experimentation. From everything I've read to this point the crossover decat elimators seem to be useless gimmicks. I don't think you'll need one unless you just really want to spend that kind of cash for the conversion. As far as I know everyone who has gone with elbows has been happy with the result. I sure am. Just make sure you use DizzE's tune for best results. If you go the cheap way and hate it then all you have to do is re-load your old tune and put the cat back on.
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| | | bnz433 | | Jupiter | | | | Reg. Date | : | 10/06/2011 | | Posts | : | 1,843 | | Location | : | Clifton Park (Upstate), NY, United States |
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| | Posted : 08 Oct 2012 - 19:13 Post title : Re: Gutted Cat or Cat delete options - which is better??? (Re: daz) | | | Thanks, Daz. (EDIT - and BrackForce) - Yes, whatever I do, will include TuneECU and the proper tune. I guess I'm just playing the field to see what folks have actually measured/felt in terms of power/torque (preferrably dyno'd compared to baseline). If the mandrel-bent 45deg elbows at $50 (or the 90deg cut in 1/2 at |$10) is equal or better than the pain of gutting the cat, or the $150-250 bypass options, then why go with either? I know "to each his own", but there's a LOT of new members getting on here, and having some tangible, meaningful guidance would be useful.
FWIW - I'm most likely going SS mandrel-bent exhaust elbows (no bypass). That is, unless someone can show technical justification to drop a few more coins to do so.
I know the ideal case would be someone with a stock 'Bird (1600 or 1700) takes it to dyno as-is. Then dyno and tune with gutted cat. Then dyno and map with bypass pipe. Finally dyno and map for just elbows. All with same pipes and filter. But that's a good chunk of coin....so not likely.
As my riding season is winding down, I'm not likely to be doing it in the next month or so. Probably one of those winter projects while crying in the garage staring at it
| Bennington Triumph Bash - 31May-2June 2019. Home of the (tied in '14 & '15) US RECORD T-BIRD FLOCKING!!!!!
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| | Post edited by bnz433 on 08 Oct 2012 - 19:15 |
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| | | daz | | Zeus | | | | Reg. Date | : | 12/05/2009 | | Posts | : | 7,709 | | Location | : | United States |
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| | Posted : 08 Oct 2012 - 19:24 Post title : Re: Gutted Cat or Cat delete options - which is better??? (Re: bnz433) | | |
bnz433 wrote:
I know the ideal case would be someone with a stock 'Bird (1600 or 1700) takes it to dyno as-is. Then dyno and tune with gutted cat. Then dyno and map with bypass pipe. Finally dyno and map for just elbows. All with same pipes and filter. But that's a good chunk of coin....so not likely.
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i think i can be pretty accurate in telling you what i think the difference would be. I ran Dizze's WITH cat map and the difference between that and the bike with the tors tune was such that once the tors tune adapted, it seems to lose power and dizze's was a bit better. But erasing adaptions made the tors tune feel a bit stronger. So they were close to the same. therfore i think you can take Dizze's dyno results as what you will see between your bike now with pipes and tors tune and pipes+decat and his tune, which is what i stated above, 9 ft lbs and 5 HP at 3500.
Oops...make that 7.4 Ft Lbs. Still good tho and pulls really strong regardless. I don't know where i got 9. in any case looks like 7.4 @3500 and 5 HP@4000. here ya go...
| 2010 Blue/White Thunderbird, "Brutus". 1700 kit, short tors, gutted cat, UNI filter, filter seal off, custom tune. Brutus in his native habitat: Link
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