Topic: How Does A Cat-Back System Work?

[bluedevil]

 
 In general a cat-back exhaust system consists of several pieces of bent tubing, combined with a high-flow muffler that improves exhaust flow for increased engine performance. The term cat-back comes from the fact that the system starts from the rear of the catalytic converter and includes all of the appropriate pieces to exit the vehicle.

The reason why they work so well is that the factory exhaust is typically more restrictive, due to the crimped bending techniques used by the OEM manufacturer and the restrictive mufflers that are designed to deaden sound not flow for performance. Decreasing the backpressure of the exhaust system is critical in allowing the engine to breathe and thus, gain more power.

One of the other benefits of a cat-back exhaust system is that it can actually create a vacuum that can help extract the exhaust gasses through it. It’s kind of like a siphon effect, as a properly tuned system will combine all of the engine’s exhaust pulses so that they pull each other out through the tailpipe.

Aside from increased horsepower and torque, a high-flow cat-back exhaust is a good idea if you plant to tow a boat, trailer or simply want more throttle response and acceleration from an old sluggish feeling truck. Typically, installing a high-flow exhaust system will yield anywhere from as little as 8-10 horsepower increase from a stock, late-model engine, to as much as 20 horsepower increase. Of course, this all depends on the restrictions in the factory exhaust system and smaller increases in performance typically mean that the factory exhaust system was pretty good to begin with.

In most cases however, adding a high-flow cat-back system to any truck or sport utility vehicle will yield some improvements. Furthermore, any other performance modifications you may add to your truck, such as a power programmer, air intake system, performance camshaft or even a supercharger, will work better with a free flowing exhaust. So it’s a good investment for your truck’s future.

 
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