chuxtruk

The more things I wind up doing on this truck the more I realize that the former owner, a Texas cowboy who used this truck on his ranch, was no truck mechanic, was no welder and was no interior specialist either. I hope his ranching skills are further along than his mechanical handiness....
Due to a problem with the 1st MagnaFlow exhaust system, this one arrived considerably faster than the first one. And it was the correct part number and as soon as I opened the box and looked at the downpipe I knew it was the right one. Getting the old stuff off was a piece of cake as I installed a new blade in my SawzAll, plugged her in and away it & I went. Probably half an hour for the removal of the old pipes tho disconnecting the old downpipe from that knuckle behind the turbo took about a half pint of Liquid Wrench as a presoak and an attack from both under the truck and then standing up too. I wire brushed the bolts and then installed the new downpipe. It went right together. Now here's where I started to run into difficulty tho I hadn't yet started thinking bad thoughts of the TX cowboy. While I'm no Ace muffler mechanic, these after market exhaust systems are fairly close and usually pretty easy to get on and they make lots of them. The directions showed a pic of the 2 different mid pipes ahead of the muffler and then the 2 pipes that're left over at this stage go behind the muffler, exiting where the stock system does. Well, when I laid it out like it showed in the pic none of the rubber hangers up above matched up. So that's what those brackets are up there for!! In fact, the rubber pieces that the pipes mounts slipped into were....MISSING!! I'm thinking, if those things are gone, what was holding up the exhaust pipes?? So I crawled out and took a closer look at what I had cut out and the first thing that struck me was that this system had been...modified. It had a very short muffler and some wire feed welding performed that was a REAL MESS. Wire still hanging on the terrible looking welding job...wow. I joked my girlfriend could've welded better than that. (This wasn't his first welding job that I have found on this truck either. Apparently, he pulled a 5th wheel goose neck type trailer occasionally as the ball is still in the truck. I've tried to remove it but have come to the conclusion that this will have to be cut out with the torch. But he WELDED a cross piece between the wheels for this ball to mount to. Even tho I don't know this guy, looking at his weld jobs and lack of mechanic skills from his mods on this truck, I KNOW ALL ABOUT HIM!!! and enough to to know the type of truck owner he was/is. Too proud to have someone else do it & too cheap to have it done right (tho I'm sure he had no qualms about spending $100 on his wire feed welder! HA!)....you know the type too!!!) But there was also a piece of pipe clamped in....it was about this time that the first bad thoughts about the Texas cowboy were coming into my head. Apparently, he had removed the rubber pieces and used different kind of hanger in the one place that the muffler SHOULD be going....GOD WHATTA MESS!! thinking bad things about that cowboy again and wondering why they'd sell him a welder without a note from his Mom!!!
Anyway, I laid it all out in every different combination I could and finally (and luckily) got the system together LIKE IT'S SUPPOSED TO BE, clamped up good and tight. It's up and tucked in nice and out of sight on my truck & a VERY SOLID system. I didn't put on the final tail pipe on as I may want that coming straight out of the rear instead of out by the rear wheel....I don't know yet but a shop will probably have to finish that off if I go that route.
But ever so slowly and piece by piece, I'm EXORCISING all traces of the cowboy from Texas who screwed my truck up while calling it his....

B.A.Ram

hahahaha, you'd think if someone wants to spend that much on a truck that would at least want to make sure the things they put on there were done properly. BUT I have a few friends who have been known to "southern engineer" their vehicles to save a few bucks...

BigBlue

Hey, what's wrong with a little ingenuity when installing parts.

riversidediesel

I used to live in a house like that. The garage leaning to the left and the walls inside the house were not too solid. Heck if I got into a fight and got thrown into a wall in my room I would've landed in the dumpster outside.