Hi guys, I have been lurking on the forum for quite a while, but I rarely post anything. I just thought I would post a quick thread sharing the things I have done to my Z performance wise. If you could care less, stop reading now and leave. Please don't flame When I bought my car it already had an AEM cold air intake and that was about all mod wise. The first thing I did was installed a Motordyne plenum spacer. Overall that was a pretty easy upgrade, the instructions were a little confusing at times, but I pushed through. My next upgrade was of course a new cat-back exhaust system. I decided to go with the Injen SES for about 1200 bucks. All in all it is a great system. I did have a little bit of a fitment/rubbing issue, but it was nothing a jackhammer couldn't fix Also be aware that the system does get quite a bit of drone, but it doesn't bother me that much. Today I installed motordyne ART pipes. The process was pretty time consuming, I have done all this work myself so it can go pretty slow at times. I had a little bit of rubbing with one of the heat shields, but again it was nothing a few dozen hammer blows couldn't fix. Starting the car up it sounds fantastic: deeper growl, as far as loudness goes I was pleasantly surprised. This is my daily driver so I did not want the car to be extremely loud. At idle it is maybe 1.3X as loud as normal and during revs it is much louder. Unfortunately I do have a little bit of rattle (probably that damn heat shield!) I haven't had a chance yet to take it on the street and give it a real test, but hopefully the rattle won't be loud enough to be a problem. I have read that the ART pipes totally eliminate drone so I am looking forward to finding out in the morning. Anyway, does anyone have a similar setup with their Z? What do you think about it?

 

OP there's a bolt above one of thethe resonatoin chamber(?) i believe that's rubbing. i had the same issue with mine.

 

Cliff notes?

 

350 words too much for you?

Here's your cliff notes version

-AEM CAI
-Motordyne Plenum Spacer
-Injen SES catback exh
-Motordyne ART pipes

it rattles. why?

 

I did shave off that bolt the hangs down on the driver side, but unfortunately the pipe still rubbed against the actual heat shield itself. I pounded in the heat shield with a hammer and got it out of the way but i believe the heat shield is actually rattling against the body of the car. I took it out for a few hours of driving today and all in all, I'm really pleased with the ART pipes. There is definitely still some rattle on deceleration, but it is very slight and doesn't really bother me very much. At least not enough for me to jack my car up again and tear everything out to fix it. I'll probably just try to fix it next time I have it up for something else. I could definitely notice a difference in the low end torque. The tires spin much longer in second gear. They sound great under load and cruising on the freeway is easily bearable for me. I have seen a lot of people complaining about the smell, but I think they must be hypersensitive because it really doesn't seem very bad. My biggest qualm: I don't get to be the one on the street hearing it go by. I would say the ART pipes are a worthwhile buy, plus Motordyne has fast shipping and great customer service

 

Oh man, I just realized I made a typo in the word intake in my title -_-