No, taking off the cats is relatively easy. It's the third bolt on the "triangle" flange that attaches to the turbo exhuast housing.....that bolt will reduce you to sub-human...and you will hate yourself.

If you want to change cats or testpipes in the future, it's about as hard as doing it with the stock manifold...not easy...but not too difficult.

 

thanks guys for the quick resonce.