Winter is coming. But before it arrives, Milltek is coming.




I am taking advantage of the Brexit dividend. Designed and handmade in Her Majesty's Great Britain just like Desire.

 

Putting on my Borla tomorrow

 

Please take photos of the install and share how you like the Borla. I like it has nubs on the hanger bars to alleviate it from slipping out of the hanger donuts, like the OE. I like the Milltek in less number of pieces and clamps.

 

It is partly of this video my Miniac took of Desire that I warmed up to the Milltek. Desire has a one-ball exhaust in the video. It makes more sound on the track at a distance than I thought. Now I want Desire to have more presence.


Here is my friend's very loud red Mini with just a resonator

For those on the fence, Milltek can be have at a 10% discount right now from a supporting vendor.

 

Congrats on the Milltek.

 

SO, the OP had the bolts connecting the CAT to the pipe welded on, that killed my Saturday. I just dropped Scarlet of to let someone else do what I should have been doing :(

 

Sorry for your unexpected complication. Sound like a shady practice by PO, not OP here. I need to clear my name.

Are the two bolt flanges still there? If so why can't you just grind off the bolts? I know. You were expecting an easy job but anything requires crawling under the Mini is never easy.

 

The whole herd of 3 R53 Minis will all have the same Milltek.

 

That's an awesome build. And nice they all have it.

 

I've done everything from changing the overflow tank, crank seal o-ring, LCA bushings, inner ball-joints. I'm used to crawling under Scarlet, didn't have a grinder, one of the few tools that is not in my chest. I guess the shop I took her to had one, they did the job in less than an hour, $150 later, I still won't be able to hear her until I get home tonight. Meeting some friends after work, so it will be a late night. Will be waking the neighbors when I get home tonight

 

Congrats on the Milltek! Did you go resonated or non-res? Header too? CooperSAZ has the full system on his car and it sounds excellent. I'm running the resonated cat-back with a crappy welded-up oem header, and still I love it. You're going to love how your Mini's rear looks (and sounds) for the next few months.

 

Non-resonated, despite that I normally a silence is golden kind of guy. Seeing how hot the exhaust system can get driving on the track I don't want a lump of red hot cylinder under the gear shifter. As the Mini is still a street car named Desire I will have nothing but the stock header so we can all breath better. I also read that most aftermarket headers use inferior cat as good cat cost a lot more. Milltek header uses a high quality German cat is what I read.

You got the Milltek and many good bits for excellent price.

 

Got the Borla on yesterday, this is the Barry White of R53 exhausts
I've heard many videos on youtube and they can't convey the deep sound of this exhaust. The pops are awesome. I have the aggressive system, this thing sounds AWESOME, did I say that already .....

 

I am very disappointed. After a few hours getting the exhaust hung. I was in the final stage of connecting the 2.5" main pipe at the two flanges. Only then to discovered the flange that mates to the header is welded crooked. By crooked I mean the flat mating surface of the Milltek flange does not mate flat to the stock header's flange. It is not a little off, but a lot off. I know better not to use brute force to try pulling them together as stainless steel is brittle.

it is the flange on the long pipe in the photo that was welded crooked




Right now I am screw as my Mini is up on jack stands and I am not going to waste labor to put my old exhaust back.

 

Here are three photos of the grossly crooked flange.

here you can see the slanted plane of the Milltek flange (left side) and the stock header flange (right side)


here I use a square to show the extend that the flange is not perpendicular to the main pipe



this is the main pipe in question (the left hand segment)

 

That SUX!!!! Spent all that time to find out the flange is bent, did I say that SUX!!!!
Are the going to replace the unit? What did you decide to do?

 

You may have to take it to a muffler shop and get it straightened out. Not sure what else you could do other than hit it with a hammer but that is NOT a good idea. My Megan Racing was just a hair off, not as bad as yours, just a touch off. No matter how much I tried, I could not get a great seal in that same spot. So for the first 3 years I replaced the gasket. I have since stopped... when I probably shouldn't have. Just another $10 and an hour of being under the car every year that I got tired of doing. I am tempted to take it to a muffler shop and just have them deal with it once and for all. The second segment, I noticed the other day, has sprung a leak. May just have them weld that up permanently if I take it for the front section.

 

I contacted the ECS Tuning yesterday right away and sent them photos. I expect them to make right with the crooked pipe flange with a replacement. There is no excuse for Milltek to have such shabby quality. The only way to build these products is to use jigs and obviously if they do, they use them very poorly, or the jigs are poorly designed or made.

When I encounter the problem I thought the cat back may very well manufactured in sweatshop in China like most eBay ones are. The pipes have a welded on SS plate with part number and Made in England on it.

Do not consider welding the cat back to the header. It will be a servicing nightmare if you have to replace the header.

 

Yeesh, the weld even isn't pretty. Yeah I agree, I think it was just a dud. Sorry about your luck--I promise that once the midpipe section is sorted and the exhaust is installed, every bit of frustration will melt away.

 

yeah, it would just be the axle back part that I would have them weld up.

 

Here is an update with the Milltek cat back exhaust. It took 3 phone calls last week to ECS Tuning to only be told that they will not send out just a replacement main pipe. That I can understand but I was initially told that their purchasing department will determine the right part number. 2 days wasted as I was thinking may be they were working the Milltek to send a replacement pipe from UK. That was not the case and they done nothing when I called on Friday to follow up.

On the third day I was then told that the ECS Tuning will not send out anything until I ship the entire box back to them via RMA, which means I will have to wait over 2 weeks before a replacement cat back arrives. I decided to pay for a second set - and they shipped it last Friday. I joked with my friend that it would be most funny if I ending up having to RMA both sets if it turn out the second set also has the same crooked flange.

Today the second set arrived via UPS. I quickly open the box and checked the main pipe. Guess what? The flange too have nearly the same tilt as the first set in the photo. I am not amused. They definitely used a crooked jag to set and weld this flange.

The Mini's header has a flex joint and if one chooses, just go ahead and pull the two flanges together at the joint. I see two problems with this. As you can see in the photo doing so will move the segment of the exhaust pipes off center towards the side where the O2 sensor is, by may be 1/2 to 3/4 inch. The O2 sensor's cable will be banging against the heat shield and may break eventually. Additionally the flex joint of the header will now have a sideway bend in addition to the vertical bend that is intended to absorb the fore/aft rocking motions of the engine. Having experience a broken header at the track made me very cautious not to impose undue stresses on the header.

Milltek main pipe (left) and stock header (right)



Another concern I have is with the main pipe skews to one side how well will it seat in the center silicone rubber hangers. Unlike the stock exhaust the Milltek hanger bars do not have the nubs to prevent them from slipping out of the rubber hangers.

It has been raining today and I was not able to crawl under the Mini to take a better look if I can make it work without ending with an exhaust that rattles and bang around each time I go over a bump. So far this has been a very unpleasant experience. Before I decided to take my chance with a second set of Milltek I was seriously considering buying a JCS cat back to avoid dealing with this shoddy quality.

 

I'm going to be replacing my header this weekend as well--I cracked it because I didn't think to check my mounts after cracking the first one. I'll take a photo of how the two join up and get back to you, but I can totally see where you're coming from about the rattles. Ever since I had mine installed, I've had a momentary-but-annoying exhaust rattle from the firewall, but only if I accidentally let the engine rpm's drop below 1k rpm when taking off from a stop.

If mine (many years old) is welded on perpendicular, perhaps an email directly to Milltek is in order? They have a huge reputation to uphold within this community...you might have caught a bad batch! An email certainly can't hurt.

That being said, the Milltek sounds really, really good. Maybe try bolting it up and driving around for a few days--you might find you like it enough to deal with the shoddy flange.

 

If you can take a photo with a square like I did I would really appreciate it. I have many theories as to why this particular flange is so crooked. I might give Milltek in UK a call but I am not hopeful it would be fruitful.

 

I would just send it all back and get the Borla, I'm loving mine, fit, finish, and it has the nubs on the tip of the hangers, no sliding, no binding and NO RATTLES!

 

Having received two sets of the Milltek cat back with the same flange on the long main pipe segment have the same off-square made me suspicious. I got up at 2:30 AM to call Milltek in UK. The person the phone said he is not technical and asked that I get a photo of the ID tag of the part in question, and he will relay the issue to the right person. The ID tag is the small welded on stainless steel plate with part markings. Every piece of the Milltek kit has a unique ID tag with "Made in England" etched on it.

I went back to bed after making sure Leigh has everything he need to follow up. By the morning Leigh has reply with the answer with an email. It as sent within a few hours of our last correspondence. I was impressed with their responsiveness.

He had checked with their production team who checked their master pattern, and the off-square angle of the flange is apparently normal, which I interpret it is as per designed.

The next day I decided to go ahead and give the installation a try to see if everything "square up". My original hangup was the ~7 degree of offset angle will skew the main pipe to one side instead of well center in the exhaust tunnel, and possible push the O2 sensor against the aluminum heat shield.

It turned out the ~7 degree offset is mainly vertical component, with no measurable horizontal component. Being only vertical component it is absorbed by the stock header's flex joint. I was able to reuse the stock gasket that consist of a ~1mm thick stainless steel sheet metal. When all the joints (there are 3 in total) are properly tightened the long main pipe sits perfectly center in the exhaust tonnel. It is also horizontally true as well as long as all the exhaust shock-mount hangers are in good condition.

My other hangup on the Milltek's hanger bars lacking the nubs turned out to be immaterial, as least with my specific unit. Once the three joints are properly tightened the muffler assembly is rock solid with respect to the Mini undercarriage. If I grab onto the tail pipes with my hands I cannot wiggle them in any direction due to the excellent (6 point support) hanger systems of our Mini.

I suspect Milltek chose to not adhere to the interface boundary (maintain a perpendicular plane of the flange) of the stock header was done to accommodate their own header, for whatever reason. To this accept as the cause of my original concern. Now seeing the installation result I am satisfy that it is an excellent product I retract my charge of shoddy workmanship.

I chose the Milltek over other competitions because of the one-piece muffler assembly design, country of origin, and price. Seeing how driving on track can beat up an exhaust system I did not want the Borla that has too many joints. The Stratmosphere appears to be very high quality, and most alike the Milltek and with the nubs on the hanger bars. It is however priced much higher. In all I am now quite pleased with my purchase.