Moving on to the exhaust system we installed a header, overpipe, catted front pipe, and cat-back. Let’s first start off with the cat-back portion. After some discussion we felt the Invidia’s sound and quality made the most sense and visually the Blue Titanium Burned tips would look great on the white paint. Here’s the stock exhaust to start…
Although the stock exhaust isn’t a bad system, there are a few good reasons to install a new exhaust. For this car in particular, it will be seeing more condensed air going into the engine. At Touge, balance of a car is crucial. Denser air in, means more exhaust coming out. An aftermarket performance exhaust like the Invidia Q300 will provide a more free flowing exit of the exhaust gasses. If you do not have a SC kit or have plans to get one, an aftermarket exhaust adds a nicer exhaust sound as well as much prettier rear end aesthetics. We have to say, the fit and finish of the Q300 is super. It fills in the spaces there for the muffler tips sit very nicely, especially compared to the stock exhaust. The Ti tips add just enough colour and contrast and follow the “Blue Sky” theme.
We took photos of each section of the new Invidia Q300 for you to see up close of how the fit and finish is. Here is the centre section or mid-pipe with a nice big resonator to remove drone and raspiness.
And here is the muffler/tips. We have to say, we really like the Q300 on the BRZ. It provides an exceptionally clean look.
Now let’s move onto the overpipe and front pipe. With most street cars we recommend having at least a single high-flow cat in the system to reduce smell from the raw exhaust. For this we chose the Invidia Q300 Catted Front pipe which is one of the best quality catted front pipes on the market for the price. To mate to this we initially had ordered an Invidia overpipe but it ended up being on back-order for too long and in it’s place we used the Tomei overpipe which is similar in terms of quality and fit.
Take a look at the front pipe and a bit tucked away, the overpipe.
Lastly and arguably the most important part of the BRZ/FR-S power production is the header. Here’s a comparison of the stock header vs. the Skunk 2 Header
The factory header is actually a decent piece and is equal length which is proven to be better for power production. Where it fails is having the primary catalytic converter so close to the exhaust ports. Being in this location cat light off time is greatly reduced which is great for tree hugging but not good for power production. The Skunk2 header addresses this by maintaining the equal length design but removing the catalytic converter from the system. The Skunk2 headers are 4-2-1 single step equal length headers which should really allow this car to grow as needed…..No boxer rumble going on here! The single step means there is one step from the primary piping into the larger secondary piping which then all meets at the collector.
Let’s see it on the car now.
That wraps up Part 2 that covered the entire exhaust system front to back. Here are some bonus images.
The pretty ugly stock exhaust.
And here you see the 02 sensors installed on the bungs pre built into the Skunk2 Headers, we added a third bung specifically for dyno tuning and future installation of a wideband AFR gauge.
