Don’t Forget To Tip

28 Nov Don’t Forget To Tip

Tim’s 993-swapped 911 needs one last piece to finish the exhaust before we film it a bit, so let’s check out the progress, shall we?

First, as with every other exhaust tip we make, after settling on the size and shape of the piping, we affix it to a jiggle jack (it’s a goofy name, we know) and put it up against the bumper to test fitment. Occasionally, to hold the tip in place while working, we’ll use an excess of tape. If that fails to hold the pipe in place, we’ll just use some clamps. Nothing fancy, as all it needs to do is hold the tip where we want it.

Once we’ve got the tip where we want it, we’ll leave it there and start determining how the piping must be run from the muffler to the tip. Occasionally, as with the case with the other parts of Tim’s 993-swapped 911 exhaust, the bends need to be a bit tighter than what we have lying around. In that case, it’s time to do some pie cuts. Nothing too intense, like you’d see on titanium pieces, but it’s still more work than your average weld. However, as with the case with engine swaps, everything needs to fit in a space that it ordinarily wouldn’t, so a little bit of ingenuity is required. And, as always, we’ll tack all the parts of the exhaust together after removing the tape bit by bit.

And, as one may expect, we snapped a few pictures of our backpurged TIG welds about halfway through welding the question-mark-shaped piece of pipe. The argon backpurge pushes a steady stream of inert gas over the back of the weld, so once the weld fully penetrates the metal (meaning the metal is welded entirely through), it won’t hit air on the other side and oxidize. Oxidized TIG welds create sharp edges and rough spots inside the exhaust, which can take away from exhaust flow and the sound quality we’re aiming for. It takes a little longer, but it’s worth it for the quality that comes out.

When we welded the earlier pieces of Tim’s 911 exhaust, we added some temporary braces to ensure that all the pie-cut welding didn’t warp or twist the metal, as it wouldn’t follow the strict pathways we’ve planned out, which could turn the whole piece into nothing more than scrap metal. We did the same thing with the question-mark-shaped piece, as well.

We’re almost done with the exhaust now, so we should be able to film some video of this beast very soon. However, for now, we still have to weld together the two lengths of pipe that will connect the muffler to the tip, and we have to finish welding the tip, as well. Thankfully, this stainless steel polishes up rather nicely; in the second picture, you can see just how shiny it got (sans our fingerprints) after one pass with a buffer. Not too shabby.

Have a great day and we’ll see you tomorrow!