Good Exhaust system for Towing?

[loufish]

I'm looking to upgrade the exhaust, and of course read soo many posts about exhaust drone, but I haven't really heard from those who tow. There is a huge difference between an empty truck street sound and how it sounds like while towing a load up a steep grade for 20 minutes...Any insight into which systems still don't have much drone when the Titan really goes to work?

[Treebasher]

Hey lou,

I tow with the Banks Monster exhaust. I'll be honest, it's not quiet but there is no drone in the cab at speed, 55 mph+. It's louder than stock but you can still carry on a conversation without a problem. The only noticeable cab drone I get is at low RPMs/slow speeds, up to 35 mph.

[dawgs77]

I just towed my trailer from CA too South Dakota with my JBA exhaust. Awesome sound and no drone while towing. Not too loud in the cab either.

The only drone this system has is at 1600 rpms...it's there then gone.

[Steamguy]

Just for comparison, I have a semi-custom system on my truck, and I have some drone about 1600-1700 RPM. I say 'some' because it's not nearly so pronounced as it was with the stock system. My wife didn't notice any real difference in the sound, although it is a little louder when cruising. And this is what I was trying for. I paid about $260 on out the door with taxes for the system, versus $450 and more for the other pre-built systems.

I've had the system for two and a half years, have close to 50,000 miles overall on the truck and I'm happy with it. With the better flow, the engine isn't working so hard when towing, so everything stays cooler. We went through the Utah and Colorado desert areas, and drove past Aspen just for the scenery, and the truck performed extremely well; again, no problems with getting hot.

The truck does perform better with the exhaust change. The first half of the pedal is more responsive, so I don't have to hit it so hard. I do notice that when I'm towing, I don't have to accelerate with my foot on the floor any more. I can take it easier on the truck, and I expect this to pay off on the back end with greater length of service.

I'm not made of money, so to finish off the modifications, I dropped in an Airhog (I could get that for about half of the K&N here) in the air filter box.

My particular system cuts the pipes at the back of the cats, and we follow the original routing of the exhaust, and original hanging spot for the muffler, since that's well done. It runs 2-1/2" pipe into a FM 50 (SUV) 2-in, 1-out. We come out with 3" and follow the original routing to the back fender, where instead of the Z-turn the original system makes, we dump out to the street, at a 45° angle down.

Fuel economy was something I was hoping for, but wasn't counting on it, since systems are so finely engineered these days. I drive pretty much the same way, on the same roads, including our country roads, every day. Before, I got about 14.3 to 14.6 MPG. Now, I get 14.8 to 15.5 MPG.

Hope this helps.

[loufish]

I've been thinking about going with a FlowMaster, just wasn't sure how loud it would get while towing under heavy throttle. I have a real good muffler shop here in Burbank that does tons of custom systems, and does great work...

[QWIKWHIP]

I've got about 16kmi on my truck and at least 10kmi of them are while towing. So I needed something with no drone as well. I've tried a few different configurations. First was a flowmaster 40 series and that was horiblle. I couldn't even bear towing with that muffler. So I went to a Gibson Dual Sport. The Gibson is awesome. No drone, not obnoxious at all. I then put a Volant intake on. Man did that thing svck! That made more drone than then the flowmaster exhaust! So I ditched that and now have a K&N drop in filter with my Gibson exhaust and that is a great combination for towing.

[ptgarcia]

My Gibson exhaust was pretty tame, even while towing. While cruising with the trailer in tow it was hardly noticeable. It never got to be a nuisance, even to my nagging wife!