Midsections So Fast You’ll Freak

29 Dec Midsections So Fast You’ll Freak

In continuing with our frenzied pace, fabrication put together this beautiful C55 AMG’s midsection in the same time it took us to make the E46 intake. And they made it at the same time as the intake. Oh my.

Everybody’s hands were in the fabrication pot for this midsection. Craig, Tom and AJ all spent time on this midsection, and the results truly show through. Once they started working, they didn’t seem to stop for anything short of going home to sleep. Now that it’s done, they can rest easy knowing that they succeeded with flying colors. Not that there’s any extra time for sleep, though; at Fluid, there’s always something that needs to be cut, welded, drilled, you name it.

For this particular midsection, the owner requested that we only delete the primary catalytic converters and replace the pipe up to and including the Y, just before the resonator box. We chose to utilize the original header flanges to ensure proper fitment without wasting time (or money) cutting and re-cutting different flange designs. The pipe is 2.5″ stainless steel from head(ers) to toe with a custom-made Y-pipe at the back end. To make sure that fitment was as close to OEM as possible, we fabricated and welded on the brackets you can see just past the second set of oxygen sensors. We placed the oxygen sensors right where they would fit on the OEM midsection, as well. In order to combat the obvious CEL (check engine light) that would come on when the vehicle realized its cats were missing, we custom-fabricated a set of defoulers for the bottommost oxygen sensors. Defoulers, if you don’t know, space the oxygen sensors farther away from the exhaust in order to “confuse” the vehicle’s computer into believing that the catalytic converters are still installed, eliminating that pesky CEL from bothering you 24/7.

As always, Tom and Craig did excellent work on the welds (including the defoulers), and the end result really shows through when you get a chance to look at the underside of this C55. In terms of the exhaust note, it’s definitely gained a good growl and aggressive note in the higher rpms, with a more subtle grunt in the lower end. After the test drive, everything is running great. Since pictures are always more fun than words, here are a few, starting with the gross old midsection we replaced: