Flashark/temu/eBay exhaust - 986 Forum - The Community for Porsche Boxster & Cayman Owners

Never thought these words would be used in combination with Porsche but here I am I ordered flashark headers for $108 shipped to my door. The test pipe/mid pipe I got from temu for under $100. These are also sold on eBay and I believe are all the same regardless of where you buy them from. I did not buy the axle back because I've heard bad reports of droning Install was very straight forward. Before you install anything, make sure the header and mid pipe flange are compatible, especially if buying from different places. Mine were fine but I saw a YouTube video where they were not fine. This car has the easiest header/exhaust manifold of anything I've seen. You'll need a 13mm and 15mm 6 point socket, O2 socket, and a wobble extension (I think, I used one so that's what I'll say to be safe). I soaked the bolts in sea foam deep creep. Everything came loose no problem. I dropped the mid pipes first, then the headers. The U pipe was the biggest pain, it was stuck to the axleback. The header flange was flat. I had to use a file to clean up some slag kn the outside sealing surface of the flange, but not a big deal. The driver side went fine. It's a little tight and took some force to get the mid pipe lined up with the u pipe. The passenger side did not go well. I'm not sure which piece is the culprit but the exhaust hit the sway bar. It wasn't even close to lining up with the hanger or the U pipe. With a pry bar, complete disregard for the health and safety of my rotator cuff, and a map gas torch, I got it in place. But it still hit the sway bar. So I got all the header bends red hot, mid pipe bend red hot, and the hanger hot. Then pryed upward trying to create clearance. I was sort of successful. There is clearance and it's no longer touching the sway bar. But it's still too close for comfort. I'm assuming the whole power train is going to flex and cause it to bang the sway bar. So next step is going to be to mark where its by the sway bar, get it red hot, and smack a dent into it with a 4lb mini sledge. Or I will attempt heating various parts of the exhaust and bending some more. . So... I got what I paid for. The fact the driver side fits flawlessly is a bonus I wasn't expecting. I'll add pics in a bit.

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You will be alone in that opinion! My replacement engine had 6 of 12 bolts snapped in the block. They are notorious for this failure. Glad you seemed to get it to work! I have the secondary cat pipes, c pipes, and aftermarket muffler/tips. Little drone, but it makes the BEST fluttering noise when you lift off throttle. All the burbles. I can't run catless so still have factory manifolds, but debating a RoW tune now that I am OBD exempt.

I can't upload pics because they're too large. But the exhaust isn't banging the sway bar from what I can tell. I feel a performance difference, but wouldn't call it night and day. 2-3k is noticable, and it just feels a little stronger overall. I should have checked my MAF reading before, but I'm seeing 20.17 lbs at 7k WOT. using ricer math of 9.5 lb/whp, I'm at 190 whp at 7000 feet elevation. SAE correct to sea level and that's about 240 whp. Seems within reason, maybe a tad high. I'm working on getting row as well, ecudoctors can do it. Softronic hasn't replied. Chipwizard hasn't either. I can't get my DME code from anyone to flash ROW myself. For now I ordered Temu spacers with catalyst material inside so we'll see if that works. My fuel trims are perfect, within 2.5%. The exhaust sounds awful though. The stock box is horrible, sounds like a raspy tin can. So I ordered circuit werks v2 w/ c pipe. Looks pretty similar to the eBay/temu options but has the X pipe in the tip which may or may not do something. Also like that it comes with C pipes. If it's too loud, one of the stock cats is going back in.

I wouldn’t sweat the tune. The mechanic who guided me building up my short block has a 997.1 prototype at 4.5 liters. He is running a stock ECU. He says they adapt well and he has built a lot of engines without having to “tune” them.

I don't think there's much on the table. there may be some power hiding in the variocam setting but meh. I ended up ordering a circuitwerks v2 axleback w/ c pipes. I can't stand how this stock muffler sounds. also shedding a not insignificant amount of weight. I also played around more and believe the test pipe is the issue. It looks like the stock cat fits in place just fine with the headers. Upon closer examination, something isn't right with how the test pipe flange is welded to the pipe. It's at the wrong angle or clocked wrong or something. So... I ordered the circuitwerks resonated pipe as well. Removal of stock muffler wasn't mad. I did it without removing the bumper. Remove both C pipes. There are studs going through the top of the transmission. So undo those 2 nuts. Then unbolt the rest. It takes some wiggling and shimmying but eventually got the stud to pop out from the transmission. it looks like it's not going to work but I kept playing with it until it did.