587 Street Exhaust

Discussion of 4-Cam Type 547 engines (and all the Fuhrmann racing variants) and cars that powered them.
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Bill Sargent
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587 Street Exhaust

#1 Post by Bill Sargent »

I have been running a factory Sport 1 exhaust for several years on the 587/1 motor in my 59A. However, while it looked good and sounded great, it was LOUD. Like police follow me loud.
Sport 1 exhaust
Sport 1 exhaust
I therefore decided to make a street exhaust for the car. Jacques LeFriant’s exhaust fabricator, Bob Butler, was making some late 904 equal length headers. He was kind enough to make a custom set in stainless steel for me that are 3/4” closer to the motor and angled up 5 degrees more.
Custom headers
Custom headers
The muffler is a custom made unit normally used on 914/6s but with the exhaust pipes spaced to match the 356 A bumper cut outs. It has a large central chamber with two smaller chambers at each end.
Muffler
Muffler
Once these parts were delivered I needed to cut in the holes for the inlet tubes. I used a tool to help mark the cutout.
Tool for marking inlet tube cut out
Tool for marking inlet tube cut out
The hardest part of the job was cutting these holes and making the fit tight enough for a good TIG weld. I then got all the flanges water jet cut from 3/8” stainless. I used the same flanges that mate with the motor to join the headers to the muffler so I could use the same gaskets.
Inlet tubes cut in
Inlet tubes cut in
I then hired Ted Atkins, a local sheet metal repair expert and welder to make a house call to help tack and weld everything.
Ted welding
Ted welding
Once this was done everything went to the ceramic coating shop.
Coated muffler & headers
Coated muffler & headers
The muffler is installed using carrera 2 support struts from the rear studs that secure the generator stand to muffler clamp bands. The installation fits nicely, however the oil suction line is only 1/4” from the muffler as it comes out of the oil tank. So some heat shield wrap will be added around the line. The tail pipes will also be shortened once I find some suitable chrome slip on tips.
Installed exhaust
Installed exhaust
Side view
Side view
Total cost including all parts and the welder’s time was about $3,100. While this may sound high for a full stainless steel exhaust system, it is over $2,000 less that the mild steel systems sold by Classic Parts.

Next step is to drive it some and see how much smaller I need to make the main jets. Factory recommends going down from 165 to 150.
Regards,

Bill Sargent
#151489 59A Cab - Faux Cam
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Harlan Halsey
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Re: 587 Street Exhaust

#2 Post by Harlan Halsey »

Bill,
I made a similar muffler for my '59 Carrera several years go to replace the P-Shooter for the street. I copied a stock 356 Muffler internals and diameter but simply used slip fit connections like the P-Shooter on the input side and spaced the twin out puts 11" apart. The clamp-on "chrome" tail pipes are actually chrome powder coat. The muffler is supported just like the stock Carrera street muffler. I am concerned about the heat of the muffler can so I wrapped it in exhaust tape and held the tape in place with a .030 SS sheet SS screw clamped in place. I haven't driven it a lot because the GT Carrera turned out not to be much fun on the street. Race cars rarely are.

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Steve Proctor
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Re: 587 Street Exhaust

#3 Post by Steve Proctor »

A recent post on this thread mentioned the "pea shooter" exhaust. Over the years, I have seen peashooter refer to the Abarth, perhaps due to the four relatively small diameter pipes as well as what I have called the Sebring exhaust, the tuned header single exit pipe configuration. For future reference, is one configuration more appropriate to the term, historically speaking? TIA
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Martin Benade
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Re: 587 Street Exhaust

#4 Post by Martin Benade »

Bill, that is a beautiful job. I suspect without your good connections it would cost quite a bit more though.
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Harlan Halsey
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Re: 587 Street Exhaust

#5 Post by Harlan Halsey »

Steve,
I refer you to the Carrera Guide where the Sebring and the P-Shooter are discussed, complete with horsepower curves. P-Shooter has nothing to do with 356 pushhrod exhausts.

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Thomas Laubscher
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Re: 587 Street Exhaust

#6 Post by Thomas Laubscher »

I have the same problem that the original 587 sebring exhaust is too loud. But on the other side it looks right to my GT. Does anyone have experience with modifying a sebring exhaust with additional silencer?

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Bill Sargent
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Re: 587 Street Exhaust

#7 Post by Bill Sargent »

I had been looking for some time for a set of chrome exhaust tips to complete the street muffler set up. All the cheap alternatives on Amazon looked like ☠️. Then I stumbled on Carrera 2 tips on Sierra Madre. 52mm ID was about right for 2” (50.8mm) tailpipes. Unfortunately they were out of stock with no date as to when they might be back in stock. Then I saw Tom Miller had a NOS (well, 1987) set for sale in the classifieds. We did a deal and they arrived earlier this week. They were a slightly loose slip fit so I used some 10mm wide by 1mm thick stainless material to make a 2” long tab that hooked on the inner edge of the exhaust tip and lay inside over the dimples. This worked perfectly.

If I were to do this again the only change would to place the tail pipes about 1.5” higher - closer to the body.
Exhaust tips side view
Exhaust tips side view
Exhaust tips top view
Exhaust tips top view
Exhaust tips top side view
Exhaust tips top side view
Thomas - I have never seen a factory Sebring exhaust modified to add something to quiet it down. I think a better route would be to work with a quality custom exhaust fabricator to make an exhaust with a muffler on each side with the muffler outlet pipes merging into a center exhaust for the look you want. This would require the fabricator to have the car. Bob Butler or Tiger Vasquez in Southern California can do this kind of work. However I believe you are in Europe. Peter Hofmann at Classic Parts probably has a fabricator who could do the work but it would be cubic €.
Regards,

Bill Sargent
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Harlan Halsey
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Re: 587 Street Exhaust

#8 Post by Harlan Halsey »

I have been making "chrome" exhaust tips for some time as I put them on all my 356s as well as the Carrera. I start with a slip-on steel tube and braze on a square cross section brass ring. I get the tube "chrome" powder coated. Easy to do if you have access to a lathe.
The Sebring exhaust was a long course racing exhaust of 2" or 1 3/4" tubing. Too big for a 1600cc race engine, as we know from SCCA racing. I would think that for a street driven Carrera the Sebring diameter would be too big, may be even for a 2-liter engine. My Carrera street set up is 1 5/8" all the way, as is the p-shooter BTW. However, with these can muffler exhausts, the tubing diameter may not make much difference.
Last edited by Harlan Halsey on Tue Dec 20, 2022 4:12 pm, edited 1 time in total.

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Martin Benade
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Re: 587 Street Exhaust

#9 Post by Martin Benade »

Your 1 7/8” exhaust is even more unsuitable for the street then?
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Harlan Halsey
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Re: 587 Street Exhaust

#10 Post by Harlan Halsey »

Oops! 5/8" not 7/8"

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Thomas Laubscher
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Re: 587 Street Exhaust

#11 Post by Thomas Laubscher »

Hi Bill

Yes I'm located in Europe. I'll try to build a sebring style muffler. Hofmann told me that an silencer insert into the end could be a solution, but have no experience if this is enough.

Tom

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Bill Sargent
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Re: 587 Street Exhaust

#12 Post by Bill Sargent »

Hi Thomas - I have tried the silencer insert in the end of the exhaust route and found it did not quiet things down much.

I had a Sebring exhaust on a 356 pushrod motor that came with a silencing insert - it did little to nothing. In the 4 cam sport 1 exhaust I recently removed from the 2L 4 cam I installed a supertrap type silencer in the end. It too did little to reduce the noise.

The custom street muffler set up reduces the noise significantly, but still nowhere near as quiet as a 356 C/SC with a factory muffler.
Regards,

Bill Sargent
#151489 59A Cab - Faux Cam
#159176 64C Cab
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Alan Klingen 2
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Re: 587 Street Exhaust

#13 Post by Alan Klingen 2 »

The 4 cam street exhaust has two small inter mufflers and I don't see them on your system Alan The Stable andBTW The street system gives the motor much greater low end response. Alan The Stable.

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Bill Sargent
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Re: 587 Street Exhaust

#14 Post by Bill Sargent »

Hi Alan - I chose not to replicate the factory pre muffler cans on my street exhaust to simplify construction and keep the cost down. A full factory type Carrera 2 exhaust would be $6K to $8K in mild steel. My exhaust was ~ $3K in stainless steel. It is not as quiet as a factory Carrera 2 exhaust system but it is significantly quieter than the factory sport 1 exhaust that was previously on the motor.

Low end torque has not been an issue. I purchased the 587/1 motor from Stanley Gold who used it as a spare vintage race motor in his 904. It was built to 904 street specs with early 904 cams, 904 P&C and 49mm intake/43mm exhaust valves. It dynoed at 175 hp and has decent torque from about 2500 rpm.
Regards,

Bill Sargent
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Harlan Halsey
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Re: 587 Street Exhaust

#15 Post by Harlan Halsey »

Bill,
You did a beautiful job on that Carrera Street exhaust. However, racing engine exhausts, Sebring or P-shooter in this case, were designed to produce maximum power in the race engine power band. Noise was not the slightest consideration. There is a tradeoff between power and noise. If your 904 2-liter engine wasn't dynode with your quieter street exhaust, it doesn't produce the 178 hp. with it. Much Less.
The Carrera guide gives about 130 hp for a 1600cc race engine with the race exhausts. That would scale to about 174 hp. for 2-liters.
Same for Lars, if he replaces his Sebring exhaust with a quieter one, it will produce less hp. There is a bolt on side exhaust version of the Bursch which uses a good size muffler and which reduces the noise quite a bit. I think our solution is the best one for quieting a street Carrera. I suppose you could try a center exhaust and make it look like a Sebring.

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