Pros and Cons

[JTM9597]

I have a 97 F-350 with a 7.3. I'm still in school and money is tight so the question is this: should straight pipe the exhaust from the cat back? What performance and sound differance will ther be? Thanks!

[backwoodsboy]

If you're running the stock downpipe, a straight piped exhaust won't make much of a difference. The "cobra-head" dp is where most of the restriction is.
Save your money, and go for a larger DP to a 4" straight pipe. You'll thank yourself in the long run.

[glovemeister]

Outside of a 6637 airfilter, and a 3 inch down pipe to a straight exhaust, and then later on boost and egt gauges, you shouldn't do anything. I will guarantee you this, you being in school makes me think you don't have much money laying around. I would reccomend that you make these mods and then get at least $1k saved up for emergency vehicle repairs. It would sure suck to have a super sweet pickup that was broken down until summer time because you couldn't get money to buy a turbo, or water pump or whatever it was that was broken.

Too many people look at flash instead of the boring repair/maintenance.

[Fordman247365]

For a low money mod, lose the cat and muff, even with the crappy DP your still better off without the rest of it. Dont know how strapped you are, a 3" dp is $89 right now, then you could straight pipe your 3 1/2" exhaust for now.

And x2 on what Glove said

[Red '97]

im a poor high school kid too, and i just did mine a bit at a time. got the downpipe first, i disconnected the exhaust from the stock downpipe and then put my 3 inch downpipe in and i ran it like that for probably 4 months. then when i had the money i finished it with a side dump. ive only got like 200 bucks more or less in my exhaust. not hte best way to do it but worked well for a kid whos underage and underpaid haha

[backwoodsboy]

The only thing worse than being a poor high-school kid, it being a poor college kid. Upside is, I'm a Vehicle Design Engineering Major, so I have lots of recources to play with when the truck does decide to give me some trouble.
Like glove said, make sure you have enough saved up to pay for maintenance before you start upgrading the truck. A new exhaust system will run you about the same as new batteries, but you can't drive the truck without batteries.

[JTM9597]

Thank you all for your input. They all sound good and wise!

[JTM9597]

One more question about the down pipe. Does it have to be a 2 peice dp or do they make regular 3 inch single dps? Wich one should I use?

[backwoodsboy]

MBRP makes a one-piece downpipe.
MBRP Performance Exhaust
Thats what I'm running on my truck. No complaints so far.