Ok, a few more mods to share. Last Friday I installed the Pypes after cat X pipe. This is a $190 piece that actually replaces the back half of the OEM cat pipe. It essentially replaces the H section with an X section. It's the same 2.5" diameter piping but has a better flowing X pipe connection which takes advantage of the exhaust pulses for improved flow.
Measure twice, or 6 times and cut once. The marker lines were to tell me where the new X pipe will meet up with the cat pipe (the right line) and the other mark is where I was intending to cut the stock pipe. I gave myself 2" and really wanted some good overlap. This was the first pipe I cut. I missed the mark more than I wanted to. I blame the tight quarters under the car while trying to have a solid grip on the sawzall. haha
Here's the post cut comparison. The Pypes X pipe came with these exhaust hangers. I don't know what for as the stock car doesn't have anything to hang it to. I guess you could add hangers to the car somehow. These hangers are right near the transmission support bracket.
Here's the X pipe installed and clamped in. LMR.com forgot to include a clamp with my SVE axle back mufflers. I told them about it and they shipped me 2 new clamps. That worked out well because the clamps that came with the Pypes X pipe were not very good at all. I didn't even try and use them.
The MGW shifter arrived on Saturday while I was at 4 baseball games! LOL I was able to install it tonight (the following Monday). Here is a comparison of the OEM shifter vs the MGW Shifter for the 2005-10 Mustang GT.
First up was to remove the center console and gain access to the shifter boot and sound deadening material.
There were a few pain in the butt moments on this install. The biggest tip is to follow MGW's instruction to lower the transmission support bracket about an inch or so. If you don't do that step, I don't know how you remove or re-install the shifter unit. It's a tight fit in there and the shifter is an odd shape.
I think the entire install took about 3 hours, including jacking up the car and putting everything away. Here's a picture of the front support bolt. This took some time but fairly simple step. Getting the bolt started with the tight squeeze for my hand took a few attempts.
Here's a view of the MGW shifter before I lowered the trans bracket. It was not going. I had to go under the car so I could better see how to maneuver it through the hole.
Here's a view of the rear bracket and alignment pins. You can see the blue bracket has slots in the mounting holes. When I was inside the car, the shifter was wanting to sit toward the driver side more and I felt like it was going to be tight so I moved the shifter to the passenger side all the way. You can see the slot peeking through as I pushed the bracket/shifter to the one side for more clearance.
Once the shifter was all bolted in underneath, I moved back into the interior to reassemble the finishing touches. Here's the important boot which seals off the gaping hole in the trans tunnel. The earlier models don't have a sound deadening piece so MGW provides some dynamat and a NVH pad. Mine, being a 2008, did have the OEM sound deadening piece and I also installed the pad but not the dynamat.
The finishing touch was the matt black "lightbulb" shaped Billetworkz shift knob and gloss black boot retainer. The instructions say to flip the shifter boot around 180 degrees since the shifter locates the shift knob further back than stock apparently.
I think it looks really sharp!
I put all the tools away and went for a test drive. The first time I went to shift into 2nd gear, I put it in 4th. The shifter is tighter and takes more effort to select the gears. It feels solid and the weighted knob feels good in the hand. I adjusted the throw about 5 turns out of the max of 10 turns allowed. If you put the shifter at its longest, its about 15% shorter than stock. So, its probably about 40-50% shorter than stock.
I leave you with this photo at the parking lot at Viewmont High School from Saturday where I watched Josh play baseball. I can't help myself from taking pictures every time I get out of the car! It looks killer! I am loving the car! I have modified every aspect of the car so far, Interior, Exterior, Suspension, Wheels/tires, brakes and engine. It's been a very satisfying process! That's it for now! I need to find an autox event to sign up for!
