Exhaust

Got myself a nice new exhaust, back box and cat. Currently got the manifold to down pipe bolts soaking in plus gas and will reapply daily until the weekend when I can do the job. So just a couple of qs before I get going

Will I have to remove the towbar to get the back box off?
Are there any snags I've not thought of?
What should I do with the old system? ( been told conflicting info. Worthless and worth upto £60 for the cat alone)

Cheers

I've just replaced my cat and link pipe. The back box was ok as i changed that last year. I did have to take the bumper off to make getting at the bolts easier, not that hard just be carefull of the wireing and you can rest the bumper on a box or something just to the side leaving the wireing attached. It may be tight fit with the towbar on but i carnt remeber how much room you have. I did what you did as well and soaked the bolts with wd for a few days and all but one came off.
Does yours have a sensor in the cat? If it does remember to take that out before you release the exhaust from the rubber mounts. Other wise you will trying to hold up the cat and remove the sensor or just end up pulling the wires out! Talking of mounts, i also sprayed them with wd and used a play of plier pipe grips and they came off a treat. The nice thing with a Jimny is the exhaust is very easy to get to, apart from the back box but thats made a hell of a lot easier by takeing the bumper off.
We have a motorvehicle section at work and once a year they take there scrap cars to the local scrap yard. They take all there batterys and Cats out and traid them in seperately as they are worth far more. I was talking to one of the guys and he said its fine if you have loads to trade in but if you went in with a single item you wont get much. If they think they can get away with giveing you peanuts, they will! Give a metal yard a go and see what they say.

Godd luck

Nobby

If the cat is in ok nick put it in the for sale section , always someone looking for one

Thanks chaps, the cat is marginal at best that's why imq changing it. Literally scraped through mot so unlikely to be useful to anyone who wants to use the car much.

I think it's going to be bumper and towbar off though so not a half hour job!

That raises a question, is it worth buying a stainless steel long life/lifetime gtee model nowadays? Cos the way I see it the cat will be the first thing to go, writing off the exhaust system.

What do you think?

You don't need to remove the towbar. I fitted mine without taking it off, a few seconds of "jiggling" and it goes on. Just take your time and hang it all before doing up the bolts as the aftermarket ones can be a tight fit and mine dropped against the towbar within weeks. Even after being re-hung it still knocks if you hit a big hump or pothole too hard.

Smoggy, a stainless will always be a worthwhile investment if its made well, usually its the welds that give up if its not been made very well. The Cat should last longer than the rest of the system. It gets hotter so doesn't suffer with the moisture sitting in it like the rest of the system. My system gave up from the cat back, the back box was shot then when i took it off the middle section practically collapsed.
All of it was the original 10 year old/79k mile system. 6 months or so later the cat went.