Im looking to put a dual exhaust on my 1988 cougar, but i see a few problems. fist off, it dosent appear that an exhaust could fit around the right side of my gas tank, i dont know if a 3.8 had a different tank than the 5.0 because the 3.8 is only single exhaust. Also, nobody has ler and tailpipe kits for the cougar, would i be able to use one from a mustang? And finally, I want to put an x pipe instead of cats, could i use one of those froma mustang as well? Has anyone done this before, and could tell me how they did it?
Search search search. Every question you asked has been asked over and over. Yes, you can put a dual exhaust system on your Cougar, our chassis' are almost one in the same with a foxbody Mustang for the most part. You can buy a mustang h or x pipe, and it will fit, but will not bolt up to the stock exhaust manifolds. If you do not have the "double hump" transmission crossmember you will need it as well. Just do a quick search, you will find everything you need to know and save time waiting for someone to reply to your thread. Also, check out the tech section at www.coolcats.net (http://"www.coolcats.net") for a lot of good info as well.
I dont mind answering your questions.... mustang tails will work but need to be extended, there is a company that makes a direct fit tail pipe http://www.stinger-performance.com as far as the 3.8 and H-X pipe I dont know for sure I'll let someone else answer that. BTW welcome to our forum :D
I had a 3.8 Bird. Same thing as yours. I took the car to a ler shop and said "I want dual exhaust with a crossover pipe". An hour later, I had dual exhaust with a crossover pipe. I used standard old Turbo lers. Sounded really nice. You have to be careful with dual exhaust, lers, and a V-6. You can't have a V-8 sound, but you don't want that loud V-6 sound either. You can swap your crossmember with the double hump style if you don't have one already. My V-6 car had one from the factory. Lucky me. If you get a 5.0 H or X pipe, it won't fit without mods, so let a ler shop bend up some new pipes. Nothing to it, and they have everything they need to do the job for you. It cost me a couple of hundred dollars in the end, but, it was done right, no worries for me about piecing together this and that for a car that never had duals from the factory,and they gave me a warranty.
Also, next time please post up information like what motor you have. You mentioned the possibility of a 3.8 and 5.0 car having different gas tanks but you fail to mention if the car is a 3.8 car or if if was a 3.8 car and now a 5.0 car or if the car was an original 3.8 car with a 5.0 tank. I think you see what I mean. Knowing what transmission is in the car is good to as the Autos are wider than the 5 speeds. You can create a signature with some light details on the car, for example:
88 Cougar
3.8L, Auto, 7.5 Rear - mods on the way
Or put the relative information in the post but without the details its hard to help. With that out of the way, welcome to the site!
Darren
Yeah right now its a 3.8, but im upgrading to a 5.0 in the near future. I found a universal x pipe and lers from flowmaster, thats all right, and yeah ill have to find a double hump tranny crossmember. I just wanted to know if there was a difference between a 3.8 and a 5.0 gas tank, like i said it dosent look like any tailpipe could fit down the right hand side of it. thanks for your help.
there shouldn't be any diff in tanks, unless someone put the wrong one in somewhere down the line
does it look like this?
(http://i784.photobucket.com/albums/yy121/daminc-pics/puttin%20it%20back%20together/IMG_0051.jpg)
Yes, the 3.8 and 5.0 tanks are the same. I have mandrel bent 2 1/2 inch tail pipes, and 10.5 inch wheels with 275-40-17's and the pipe still fits fine on the right side.
Are the fuel tanks between the 83-86 cars the same as the 87-88 cars?
Darren
Dimensionally yes , but there are two different tanks , a two hole one like jrry posted and a single hole one , I dont know when the change was but the later cars use two hole tanks
I was just wanting to confirm that before I posted my tailpipe setup. I have an 8.8 out of a Mustang, 17X9 Bullitt replicas with a 35mm offset, 275/35/17 tires, and 3" mandrel bent Flow Master tailpipes with 3" extensions welded onto the LX pipes. We ground the welds, filled the voids with more weld, hand filed them, and finished them off with HPC coating. This all fits around the stock tank.
Darren