I never wanted to do this before because the last thing I want is a noisy overlanding vehicle, it just don't go well with game viewing.
So I had a chat with Justin who is the owner of Powerflow Exhausts in Tokai, Cape Town. He told me not to worry, he will design me a system that will give me the better performance and better fuel consumption and still be as quiet as a normal vehicle.
So I took my Hilux there on Thursday. Again I stressed the point that if it is noisy I don't want it. Don't get me wrong, I just love the racy tone of an exhaust system on the right vehicle, but I want my Hilux to be quiet. One day when I build a V8 Hilux to play with I will have a proper system with the right tone installed, but not now.
First Justin took a piece of hose pipe and went through the front part of the exhaust system to check for leaks. From where the manifold bolts onto the head all the way to the first box.
He then announced that even after 430,000km the front portion of the system is as good as new. He told me that he is not going to fiddle with the front part. The original Toyota manifold is very well designed. The little bit of power you gain by fitting branches is not worth the money you spend. Then there is the famous Toyota "torque box" . He said that is one thing Toyota got right on these vehicles and you do not want to mess with or remove that torque box.
So even though he could easily have made an extra thousand bucks out of me, he advised that we leave the front part as it is. I appreciate his honesty, it shows me he does this because he wants the best for his client and not the best for his pocket.
This front part is still fine
This is the torque box they are talking about
I wanted them to change the flow of the pipe where it runs under the propshaft, but if you look on the side of the gearbox you will see that the spedo cable and handbrake cables run in the same area and putting the exhaust there will create new problems. Justin then said something I did not think about that way; "If you haven't buggered up that pipe in 430,000km it shows you that it is not really a problem"
So I decided to leave it as it is.
Justin appointed Russel Rogers to the job. This guy don't talk much and is really good in what he is doing.
He cut off the old pipe in front of the flange of the rear silencer
Then carefully put the new rear silencer in place where it will go
Bent the pipes to perfection
At first he tried to fit the small silencer under the load bin. I saw there was not much space there and then I called our Hilux specialist, Hoppy for his good advice (as usual). Hoppy said I must check, the box fits nicely on the outside of the chassis under the loadbin. So we run the pipe between the chassis and springs and put the silencer under the loadbin on the outside.
I did not do all the fancy dino testing stuff, but I can definitely feel an increase in performance, especially between 1500 and 300 rpm. No more sluggishness and it makes town driving much easier. So far I could not test the fuel consumption because on my way back to Langebaan I loaded some shelves on the canopy which had a lot of wind resistance and my next trip was to Hermanus with a trailer on. So only on my next tank will I be able to report on the fuel consumption.
As for the noise....... I think it is even quieter than the standard system used to be, so a big thumbs up for Just and Russel, they exceeded my expectations.
Powerflowcan build a system for ANY vehicle.
You can expect a performance gain of anywhere between 5 – 10% by fitting a POWERFLOWexhaust – some vehicles respond better than others
The price of the system was R2,500.00 which included everything, also a 5 year guarantee. That is the price for most "standard" 4x4 vehicles.
Apparently this price will differ if you have extra fuel tanks, a V6, or whatever you have which creates more work.
They can fit branches as well, although in my case they advised me not to, if they did the branches would have cost an extra R2,000.00
Best will be to call Justin (021 701 5513) to get a price.
