My list of big projects to get Derek’s coupe back on the road is getting short. I think most of the engine work is done, but I wont start it without an exhaust. With a flat tappet cam, it requires a 20-30 minute break in on first start, which I wont be doing without exhaust. With that, I took it to the local exhaust and welding shop to have his exhaust kit installed.

Once I got the clutch cable problems solved, I was ready to get his exhaust kit installed. I had a couple of things I wanted done before I took it to the shop. Converting from a single exhaust to a dual exhaust setup, I wanted to have the original style rear cutout valance. I still had one on the shelf that didn’t get installed on my coupe when they were doing that work, so I put it on Derek’s.

Like everything with this car, removing the old valance had some issues. Since there is so much rot in the rear, a previous owner welded the passenger side of the valance to the quarter panel and filled the corner in with body filler. I had to take the cuttoff wheel to it to remove it, then grind off a bunch of the bondo to find the real body. It turns out they welded it because the attachment point for the valance hardware had rotted off the car so there was nothing to attach it to. I made do with bad body lines for now, so that I could have the correct locations for the exhaust tips. Derek has plans to redo the body later, so correct exhaust placement is my priority now, leaving other sheet metal repairs for later.

After a little grinding to get to metal, I put on some rust encapsulator to seal up what’s there at least, then moved on.

With that done, I moved on to the brackets. The real dual exhaust cars have a support plate under the rear seat to reinforce the exhaust hangers through the floor pan. I wanted to put those in to both help locate the placement of the hangars as well as help out the old floor. At this point, I didn’t want to do too much with the floor, so I placed them and sinched them down with the seatbelt bolt and the exhaust hangers. In the future, when we get back to doing body work, I will make sure we clean up the floor pan and weld them in place once we can properly treat and protect the base metal. With the contour of the metal, and the hole for the seatbelt, they were pretty easy to place.

The hangars were what came with the exhaust kit, so they are slightly different than stock, but they are well built and get the job done. I just had to drill the 2 holes on each side for the bolts on the plates to go through. With those in place, I have a plate on the underside that attaches and provides a mounting point for the exhaust to hang from.

The next hangar was in the back, behind the rear end. They used the original bolt holes for the shipping tie downs, which this car just happened to still have attached. I understand they were supposed to be removed by the dealer as part of their prep to sell, but they are in a junk bin here now. But the holes are there for the supplied brackets.

I hung the over axle section to test fitment and see how well it aligns with the rear valance. I am pretty happy with it. It’s not fine tuned yet, so there are some adjustments needed, but when it gets to the exhaust shop, the professionals can do that.

With the front sections on the exhaust needing cutting and flaring to fit, this is all I can do myself. I could cut and weld the pipes, but I cant flare the end to connect it to the header reducer, so I just left all of that to the professionals. I put it on the flatbed and hauled it down to the shop.

A days work and I had it home again. It still hangs a bit lower than I would prefer in the front, but its far better than the long tube headers, and not going to be an issue. Over all, I think it looks good and am happy with how it turned out.

I keep seeing that spot on the rear where the paint got rubbed off somehow. I am going to have to fix that. I can’t stand seeing it after I painted it a few years ago. I have no idea how it could have happened.

To finish, I had them put on cutoff steel tips. I think the angle goes better with the lines of the car, maybe? Not going for an original look, just personal preference.

So now the exhaust is done and only the drive shaft left for major projects. There is still a lot of little work to be done, but it’s one step closer to starting up.