Headers and exhaust on 2000 boxster s?

[2000986s]

Hey everyone! I recently picked up my first Porsche- a 2000 boxster s with only 65k miles. Now I was looking to do a couple mods right away to increase power without doing too much damage to the longevity of the car. Up to this point, everything I have read says that headers and exhaust is the best bang for your buck way to increase power. Does anybody have any recommendation on brands or products? Also, if you have additional suggestions on mods I should do upfront to increase power, please share. I'm 20 years old and completely new to Porsche and building cars in general. All advice appreciated. Thanks!!

[Need_for_speed]

Welcome aboard and congrats on your first P-car. Please upload some pics when time permits! We're big fans of Porsche-Porn and like to look at other member's new rides.

Recommend doing a thread search on exhaust systems. You'll find a wealth of info. With the help of the folks here, I did some extensive research on this myself. Here are the alternatives I explored:

1. Complete Fabspeed system. Sounds great. Leaves big hole in checkbook.
2. Top Speed 1 muffler. Sounds great. Much smaller hole in checkbook.
3. Dansk muffler. About $1K. Receives mixed reviews. Looks like a sausage.
4. Cat bypass pipes. You can eliminate the secondary cats on your 2000 S with no emissions issues, as long as there's no visual inspection. Feedback from those who have done so indicate a little better sound. Fabspeed cat deletes run around $600. Top Speed sells them for much less. There is some concern that the cat deletes get hot and may cook the drive boots.
5. Crios modification. Developed on this forum. If you have a little patience and a really long drill bit, you can punch a couple of holes in your muffler and improve the sound.
6. Desnorkle your intakes. More delightful intake sound. Cheap. Do a thread search.
7. Porsche Sport Exhaust (PSE). You'll need to take out a second mortgage, or you may get lucky and find a used one on eBay. One of our members did. Lucky dog...
8. Fister/Pedro modification. If you have welding skills or know someone who does, this is essentially a poor man's PSE. You can also send your muffler to FD Motorsports and they'll do the mod for you.

I'm sure folks will step in to add alternatives to the list.

Most of the folks here will tell you that none of these will do much to improve your pony count. Less restrictive headers and cat bypass pipes will improve the flow and give you a few horses, but the cost is high for such a modest improvement. Most of us engage in exhaust mods to give the car a little more personality, or to reduce the weight of the system (that muffler is a real boat anchor). Keep in mind though, that Porsche designed the stock exhaust system as a whole to serve as a vibration damper to prevent annoying exhaust drone at certain speeds.

I'm currently in the middle of a do-it-yourself Fister/Pedro mod, as I have access to a welder and mandrel bender. We're going to ceramic powder coat the whole system when finished to cut down on heat transfer. I'll post pics when complete.

Long post, sorry. Hope it helps. Good luck and welcome!

[Dlirium]

At the end of the day, these cars "are what they are". You can eek out a few ponies with an under drive pulley (UDP) and exhaust mods, but honestly - they don't make THAT much of a difference from a performance standpoint. It's not like doing mods to a nice Chevy V8 :-)

You're 20. Put the extra $ into the looks (wheels, suspension) if you want to personalize. Save for a more powerful car if you want more HP. :-)

[CrisZenithBlue]

that is an excellent compilation of info on exhaust systems, nicely done!

unless you go for a full sports exhaust which would be less restrictive and tune the ECU to go with it you wont really get significant power. it's really not worth the money as is the case with a lot of other power gain increases in the Boxster. but heck man.. you have the S and you still want more power? i'm running around with the 2.7L and i feel the car has adequate power and the BEST part is i can actually plant my foot down and keep it there while i go through the gears and not kill myself or go to jail every time i do so.

a lot of people here will tell you the same thing: go for power increase upgrades when you've become such a good driver that you've outgrown the car in it's stock form. people have been working on that for years and it's not an easy thing to achieve.


i really do recommend a new exhaust system for some glorious sound though!
it will completely change the cars personality and you'll love it. i went through a few options before i found the sweet spot for myself personally.

i currently have the top speed cat delete pipes (normally 199$ but you can get them for 150$ like i did, i think because i mentioned the 986 forum but cant remember) and the Fister exhaust which will run you around 480$ + shipping. you get a few extra ponies with this setup but not really noticeable. and the best part.. ZERO drone!

here's the end result on a 2000 base:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=w1Efeluufu8


the first thing i did when getting my boxster was asking "how can i get more power" but then i quickly realized it doesnt need it.

do it justice and drive the crap out of it! the way it was meant to be driven!

[Need_for_speed]

Originally Posted by Dlirium

At the end of the day, these cars "are what they are". You can eek out a few ponies with an under drive pulley (UDP) and exhaust mods, but honestly - they don't make THAT much of a difference from a performance standpoint. It's not like doing mods to a nice Chevy V8 :-)

You're 20. Put the extra $ into the looks (wheels, suspension) if you want to personalize. Save for a more powerful car if you want more HP. :-)

+1 Dlirium. +1 Cris.

You might also consider spending some bucks on reliability, like water pump, drive belt, etc. (I did not say IMS. I didn't, I didn't, I didn't...) :dance:

[Dubaday]

welcome to the forum 2000986s
I also have a 2000S and made a few air flow upgrades. Fabspeed sport headers/cat, Fabspeed secondary cat deletes, and a Jetex muffler. The sound is a huge improvement, as for the horsepower gains...slightly noticable, but not worth the capita invested(if you were going for the HP gains). I do not regret the upgrades though, because the glorious sound it makes now, Justifies my exhaust expense

I'd recommend doing some research of a few exhausts before pulling the trigger on any upgrades. With that said, +1 Need_for_speed for the exhaust breakdowns!

[epapp]

The top speed muffler sounds like complete garbage IMO. Not only is it extremely cheap (something was very loose internally after 3000 miles), but if you have the hearing sensitivity greater than or equal to any 75 year old human, you will be deaf in no time. No to mention the drone from 1700-3000 rpm. I sold the muffler for 75 bucks and a huge verbal warning about how much of a POS it was.

I then bought a '03 boxster S exhaust for $100, drilled me some holes up inside the outlet pipe area and can't complain one bit (just be sure to buy an adapter to mount the later model year pipe).

I also tried out some top speed headers. The fit was not great...not even good. I had < 1mm clearance between the headers and the bottom of the crankcase at one point. The flanges where the headers met the cat pipes also leaked like crazy no matter how many ways you adjusted the connection. If the fit was better, I would have kept the headers on but because of the endless exhaust leaks, I opted for stock headers and the 03S pipe.

[2000986s]

Wow!!! I am so glad to see that people are so active on this forum, I honestly wasn't even expecting any serious replies. One thing I've definitely realized is that this isn't a car I am going to want to build to be super fast. My last car was a 2015 mustang and I was used to the high horsepower, throw you into the back of your seat kinda feeling. This little boxster s is gonna be a ton of fun and it's already plenty fast on its own. I'll throw some pretty wheels on it and focus on aesthetics, then focus on only doing an exhaust for the amazing sound, not necessarily for the +10-20hp that some manufacturers advertise. One last question for you guys- I've heard that if I'm going to do a CAI, an Evo intake is the way to go. Anybody have any experience with it, is it worth the 400$? Need for Speed: I will be posting pics on Monday when I get back from my road trip to AZ!!

[JayG]

Welcome!

Best bang for the buck performance upgrade?
Simple

Upgrade the driver!. Short of changing out the motor for a V8, you will spend lots of $$$ to increase power and get very little for it power wise

Join your local PCA club, Do a car control clinic or performance driving school. Start doing autocross and they will give you an instructor.

You will find the capabilities of the car, even in bone stock setup is far above your skills and capabilities without training and seat time.
Learn how to drive the car and then start looking at upgrades

Oh yea, It ain't real without pics

[boxxster]

From what I've read, the general consensus on intakes is that they really don't do much other than increase sound. The factory intake setup is already a cold air design that flows more than adequately. Some people have measured higher IAT's with aftermarket setups, so you might actually lose power going that route.

Exhaust wise I'd start with the top speed bypass pipes. They're cheap, relatively simple to install, and give a modest bump in sound. If thats not loud enough, add a muffler and you'll have a pretty mean sounding setup.

[Dubaday]

Originally Posted by 2000986s

Wow!!! I am so glad to see that people are so active on this forum, I honestly wasn't even expecting any serious replies.

You will soon realize this is by far the best forum. Period.

Originally Posted by 2000986s

One last question for you guys- I've heard that if I'm going to do a CAI, an Evo intake is the way to go. Anybody have any experience with it, is it worth the 400$?

I have one on mine, very cramped place to work with while installing though. It does sound a bit better along with the de-snorkel upgrade(lots of these mods help sound much more than gains as you can tell from our replies). I like it, I wouldn't go back. Do a search on it, ultimately up to you in the end.

[Dubaday]

Originally Posted by JayG

Oh yea, It ain't real without pics

OMG..... 12 yr old!!!!! all jokes lol

+1 it ain't real without pictures!

[Need_for_speed]

I discovered pretty quick that there's a bunch of really great folks on this forum. I'm glad I joined, and you will be too.

I've driven Mustangs, Corvettes and Porsches on the track. If you're coming from a Mustang, I can see why you felt you needed more power. This is a totally different car, and on the track, there is absolutely no comparison -- a vastly different driving experience.

Your car was very carefully engineered for max performance by a bunch of really clever Germans, so you'll find that, short of dropping in a supercharger, it's really hard to pull any more performance from what is already an impressive car. So +1 to JayG and Cris -- upgrade the driver. Your car is a freaking blast to drive on track or autocross, so get out there and have fun!

The only other thing I might add, is if you're going to drop some money on the car: wheels and exhaust are nice, but bear in mind that your baby is 14 years old. If you haven't done so already, take it took a good indie shop (the guys on here can help you find one) and have them give it a thorough look. If I were you, I'd swap out the water pump without a second thought. You'll see multiple freak-outs on this board about IMS bearing issues, but in reality, if your water pump dies, it will destroy your engine with remarkable efficiency. And the chances of a water pump failing are a heck of a lot higher than an IMS failure.

Stay in touch, post the pics, and tell us about your adventures!

[Dlirium]

Last bit of advice?

Put $100 into a jar every month and leave it alone. Call this your "maintenance" budget. You will eventually need it. May take 6 months, or a year...but you will need it...

[Need_for_speed]

Originally Posted by Dubaday

OMG..... 12 yr old!!!!! all jokes lol

+1 it ain't real without pictures!

So cringeworthy.

[JayG]

Originally Posted by Dubaday

OMG..... 12 yr old!!!!! all jokes lol

+1 it ain't real without pictures!

Originally Posted by Need_for_speed

So cringeworthy.

oh my

[2000986s]

Thank you to everyone on here! Definitely plan on taking some driving classes since I have never driven a car like this, and of course first step is get it fully inspected and I was already planning on replacing the water pump. After all this fantastic advice I've decided that I want to spend a couple months (at least) driving this car bone stock. I'll throw some pretty wheels on it right away and then post pics I promise!!! Haha you guys are great thanks again!!

[Need_for_speed]

BTW, that little exchange above had nothing to do with you. It was us breaking each other's b*lls over a little episode the other day when a nasty troll invaded our forum. One of our forum members, Mr. Vinny, from Jersey City, I believe, took care of that thing for us. If you know what I mean.

[2000986s]

Originally Posted by Need_for_speed

BTW, that little exchange above had nothing to do with you. It was us breaking each other's b*lls over a little episode the other day when a nasty troll invaded our forum. One of our forum members, Mr. Vinny, from Jersey City, I believe, took care of that thing for us. If you know what I mean.

Hahah all good, I didn't take any offense by it😂😂

[smshirk]

Fabspeed definitely produces hp gain. A lot of testing has been done and few others produce results. That being said, save the 4k and get a good intake. The sound from the intake is much sweeter than exhaust sound and the fabspeed drowns that out. Your car has plenty of power already for street driving. A quality cold air intake will cost you a lot of extra gas money, just to hear that swoosh in your right ear. Congrats


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