A return to form: Say hello to Banana MK2, the Italian Prancing Horse (Ferrari 458 Italia)
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Hi there
So as the weather was pretty decent on Saturday, I could not resist, the Ferrari exhaust modification was done.
Started the day by walking around to my uncles and put a coating of the new ceramic shield wax on the Vantage, also grabbed the opportunity to grab a photo of them all together, kind off, got half an Abarth and the Ferrari is lurking in the background.
The modification is surprisingly easy, you could probably do it without a ramp or jack if your small or just park it on a curb, but decided to give myself plenty of clearance and just drove it up on the make shift ramps, I survived. It is quite a simple and easy job you need:
- 4mm allen key
- 10mm socket / ratchet
- Some sharp snips to cut the metal clamp on rubber hose.
First step was to remove the rear under tray / air diffuser which is 8x 10mm bolts and then remove the six 4mm allen bolts and gently and carefully pull the diffuser away, if your car is a 488 you can do same but bear in mind a 488 has electrical connections for the active aero system and rear light.
Once it is off you have this view:
Though under trays are annoying, the advantage is a flat bottom car and everything stays extremely clean, happy to see no fluids or leaks of any kind, the camera struggles a bit but the engine area was also totally clean and dry also.
The valve in question is up in the rear bumper, I snipped the centre vacuum line, so only disconnecting one line and then simply capped it off with a cap to prevent anything from being drawn into the system so if need be it can easily be reversed.
Needless to say its a very easy way are ceramic coating your vehicle with a product that seals the car exceptionally well and gives incredible beading, it is also ideal for putting a show wax on top to really get the shine, but you can see how easy it is to do as my uncle is literally buffing of excess product single handed whilst having a brew in the other hand, it really is that easy to use. Prior to this we also machine polished the Aston too, which worked very well, we just focused on light swirls, there is a deeper scratch on roof but we kept to a minimal cutting compound simply on the basis it removed 90% of swirls without removing much of the cars clear / top coat so paint life won't be impacted.
I do have videos which I shall upload shortly for the Ferrari but needless to say it sounds vastly better, the cold start sound is now permanent as now the exhaust is bypassing the small 2.5" pipe constantly now, has no effect on drive and no error lights are flagged by ECU, I am quite behind the times on this modification but it means I can try the car now with valves always open, but for sure driving around at sub 30mph sounds much better as a V8 should, its not the most toneful V8 though at low RPM being flat plane crank, its kind of just a deep noise / burble. Full throttle noise / scream is not impacted but what I have noticed is the car burbles a lot more now at lower RPM and when slowing down, which I do like, unfortunately I only got a few minutes drive as I could see the sky turning grey so put it back in the garage, which was good time as quarter hour later it hammered it down.
Shall put a video up later but the recording did not work properly so apologies for a bit of a poop video.
So as the weather was pretty decent on Saturday, I could not resist, the Ferrari exhaust modification was done.
Started the day by walking around to my uncles and put a coating of the new ceramic shield wax on the Vantage, also grabbed the opportunity to grab a photo of them all together, kind off, got half an Abarth and the Ferrari is lurking in the background.
The modification is surprisingly easy, you could probably do it without a ramp or jack if your small or just park it on a curb, but decided to give myself plenty of clearance and just drove it up on the make shift ramps, I survived. It is quite a simple and easy job you need:
- 4mm allen key
- 10mm socket / ratchet
- Some sharp snips to cut the metal clamp on rubber hose.
First step was to remove the rear under tray / air diffuser which is 8x 10mm bolts and then remove the six 4mm allen bolts and gently and carefully pull the diffuser away, if your car is a 488 you can do same but bear in mind a 488 has electrical connections for the active aero system and rear light.
Once it is off you have this view:
Though under trays are annoying, the advantage is a flat bottom car and everything stays extremely clean, happy to see no fluids or leaks of any kind, the camera struggles a bit but the engine area was also totally clean and dry also.
The valve in question is up in the rear bumper, I snipped the centre vacuum line, so only disconnecting one line and then simply capped it off with a cap to prevent anything from being drawn into the system so if need be it can easily be reversed.
Needless to say its a very easy way are ceramic coating your vehicle with a product that seals the car exceptionally well and gives incredible beading, it is also ideal for putting a show wax on top to really get the shine, but you can see how easy it is to do as my uncle is literally buffing of excess product single handed whilst having a brew in the other hand, it really is that easy to use. Prior to this we also machine polished the Aston too, which worked very well, we just focused on light swirls, there is a deeper scratch on roof but we kept to a minimal cutting compound simply on the basis it removed 90% of swirls without removing much of the cars clear / top coat so paint life won't be impacted.
I do have videos which I shall upload shortly for the Ferrari but needless to say it sounds vastly better, the cold start sound is now permanent as now the exhaust is bypassing the small 2.5" pipe constantly now, has no effect on drive and no error lights are flagged by ECU, I am quite behind the times on this modification but it means I can try the car now with valves always open, but for sure driving around at sub 30mph sounds much better as a V8 should, its not the most toneful V8 though at low RPM being flat plane crank, its kind of just a deep noise / burble. Full throttle noise / scream is not impacted but what I have noticed is the car burbles a lot more now at lower RPM and when slowing down, which I do like, unfortunately I only got a few minutes drive as I could see the sky turning grey so put it back in the garage, which was good time as quarter hour later it hammered it down.
Shall put a video up later but the recording did not work properly so apologies for a bit of a poop video.
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Sounds brutal mate!!! Love it!
Yep me too, makes no real difference beyond 3000-4000rpm as valves always opened passed 3000rpm in race mode or heavy throttle application anyway. But now when just cruising around the engine is always singing and not muted and it pops and burbles sometimes now which is cool as its natural noises no fake rubbish.
Soldato
Sounds amazing, any issues with the neighbours?, I always wince when I drive off at 06:00 and mine is nowhere near noise of that.
Nope but to be honest as harsh as it sounds kind of tough, factory exhaust and all start ups are loud, it now just stays nearly as loud. They should be glad I no longer have my Mustang, with the Extreme exhaust it had on it, well needless to say that was crazy loud just in a none motorsport kind of way.
I guess its a little of worry as where I have moved too is a very quiet area, but there is only 7 houses in our street and as I am not starting this car up typically before 9am or coming home much later than 7pm it is generally not driven in lets say the hours where people would be sleeping and the times I will be starting up before 6am can be counted on one hand in a year.
To be honest the neighbours all live opposite and the neighbour directly opposite came over and said hello and helped us removed a big heavy post that used to be on drive and the house next to them came over and just said OMG that thing is beautiful, not actually seen our other neighbours yet but were told the house on the end is a motorbike nut and even has motorbikes in his living room and dining room, so guess he is a petrol head and am told when he spots me will no doubt chat to me for hours lol.
Soldato
Nope but to be honest as harsh as it sounds kind of tough, factory exhaust and all start ups are loud, it now just stays nearly as loud. They should be glad I no longer have my Mustang, with the Extreme exhaust it had on it, well needless to say that was crazy loud just in a none motorsport kind of way.
I guess its a little of worry as where I have moved too is a very quiet area, but there is only 7 houses in our street and as I am not starting this car up typically before 9am or coming home much later than 7pm it is generally not driven in lets say the hours where people would be sleeping and the times I will be starting up before 6am can be counted on one hand in a year.
To be honest the neighbours all live opposite and the neighbour directly opposite came over and said hello and helped us removed a big heavy post that used to be on drive and the house next to them came over and just said OMG that thing is beautiful, not actually seen our other neighbours yet but were told the house on the end is a motorbike nut and even has motorbikes in his living room and dining room, so guess he is a petrol head and am told when he spots me will no doubt chat to me for hours lol.
It's all good then, they all old fogies my neighbours but had no complaints yet apart from directly next door but she complains about everything
It's all good then, they all old fogies my neighbours but had no complaints yet apart from directly next door but she complains about everything
I think a loud car starting once or twice a day does not cause many people issues. Plus where I live in the day time there is the sound of lawn mowers and people chopping wood and stuff, plus the chickens are always making noise which if people were gonna complain it would be the chickens that are on a farm nearby, does not bother me at all but I know some people really dislike that.
Soldato
Can you go even further with making it sound nicer or is stock exhaust good enough?
I am happy with it, the stock system is rather loud and high pitched, it has that older F1 style pitch too it at higher revs, which you can maybe hear here, outside the car it is more apparent I am so told:
Some owners do remove the cats and even remove the mufflers and replace with just straight pipes, this results in a purer older extremely high pitched F1 sound but at the same time is so loud it is probably annoying, plus the issues with potential codes being thrown by ECU.
The Novitec and IPE systems tend to give the best balance of sound, loud and high pitched and a good tone, but for me the stock exhaust is loud enough, more than loud enough, not only that the Novitec and IPE even if just going for the section that replaces the back boxes I think is around £7500, a full system with de-cat or high flow cats is around £10,000 for for me when I am happy with how it sounds would be a waste of money, on the flip side if Ferrari fit said system then they will ensure no engine codes are thrown, so that is nice to know Ferrari are happy to fit and warrant such a system but maybe it is my age but the SVR and this 458 I love how they sound from the factory and don't feel the need for more noise, apart from low revs and idle, hence this valve mod.
It was the same if I'd gone with an MY18 Mustang, I felt the stock active exhaust setup sounded glorious and no change was needed, if anything in the last few years cars are sounding much better from the factory with the sports exhaust option ticked where applicable, of course the very latest cars do have particulate filters fitted which do numb the sound somewhat as can be heard on the latest F-Type and Huracan EVO, the older models did sound that bit better, but not to say the latest versions sound bad, they still sound awesome, but these epic sounding cars are a thing of the past.
Soldato
Yeah that sounds plenty good enough, I guess if cash was no issue and I owned one of these then I would look into it but that noise is epic, makes my 350 sound like a fart can, thanks for the insight, epic thing that is.
Surprised at that I always found the 350 to be one of sweetest V6 notes I’ve heard with certain exhaust systems, unfortunately I could not name said exhaust just recall hearing a 350Z once at some lights and it sounded lovely at idle and when it pulled away sounded equally lovely.
Soldato
Surprised at that I always found the 350 to be one of sweetest V6 notes I’ve heard with certain exhaust systems, unfortunately I could not name said exhaust just recall hearing a 350Z once at some lights and it sounded lovely at idle and when it pulled away sounded equally lovely.
Hehe yeah, got a miltek on mine, sounds great. Thats the reason I bought it mainly, best noise for the cash. A car has to have a good exhaust note or I wouldnt buy it. For the cash I paid for mine I couldnt find a car with a better sound, not sure what I would replace it with unless I upgrade quite a bit
Caporegime
I’m taking it as a given the 458 was tucked up in the garage during OC/UK’s blizzard today? - if not, how was a Ferrari with the white fluffy ****?
Looks good and no doubt crazy fast but do I want it? Nope and I can’t afford one either lol.
I dunno I like my cars fast but not hypersonic and I want drama and enjoyment and an element of fear and the pleasure of revving an engine out and fun at legal speeds.
So many cars these days lost in some ways the fun of driving by being too good, too capable and too easy and the sound becomes more and more muted.
I’m taking it as a given the 458 was tucked up in the garage during OC/UK’s blizzard today? - if not, how was a Ferrari with the white fluffy ****?
Tucked away.