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Been tweaking my R53 Milltek exhaust and finally almost have it finished. But I noticed I can just move it left/right very easily because the way the hangers on designed.
The first pic below shows the JCW exhaust has some barbs on the ends of the hangers which seem like they'd help this issue. The second pic of the Milltek shows how the hangers are just smooth bars.
Do I need to weld some washers onto the hangers or something to help keep the center exhaust position?
No need to I've personally installed over 100 of these and never added anything to the ends. Even had them on my personal car and employee cars no issue.
No need to I've personally installed over 100 of these and never added anything to the ends. Even had them on my personal car and employee cars no issue.
The ease at which you can slide the exhaust pipes left to right by hand is definitely not right. I've ordered new hangers (even though muffler shop said mine looked fine) to install next week. But it seems like it's going to really need more than just that?
Update: Went back to muffler shop this week. They took care of it. Initially, Milltek exhaust was making contact with under body of the car in a few spots. The issue seemed to get worse once I added the Milltek header.
They fixed that the first time I went in by cutting the right center hanger shorter and bending the car's rear hangers down. This fixed the vibration/contact issue, but opened up a new issue which was the exhaust was WAY TOO LOOSE and I could easily, by hand, shift tail pipes left and right by a couple inches. When ever I drove the car, the equilibrium point of rest for the tail pipes was the very far left driver's side of the car. Of course this looks lame.
Went back in this week. Brought with me 6 brand new genuine MINI red rubber hangers with me. They said the hangers all looked perfectly fine and that the 100% fix for this was to make 2 new hangers for the rear ones (that bolt to the Milltek exhaust based on year of car) that were 1 piece and firmer rubber with custom bent hangers rods.
I said, I just want this fixed once and for all so let's do it. $100 and now my tail pipes are still dead center after a bunch of driving. Yeah!
Update: Went back to muffler shop this week. They took care of it. Initially, Milltek exhaust was making contact with under body of the car in a few spots. The issue seemed to get worse once I added the Milltek header.
They fixed that the first time I went in by cutting the right center hanger shorter and bending the car's rear hangers down. This fixed the vibration/contact issue, but opened up a new issue which was the exhaust was WAY TOO LOOSE and I could easily, by hand, shift tail pipes left and right by a couple inches. When ever I drove the car, the equilibrium point of rest for the tail pipes was the very far left driver's side of the car. Of course this looks lame.
Went back in this week. Brought with me 6 brand new genuine MINI red rubber hangers with me. They said the hangers all looked perfectly fine and that the 100% fix for this was to make 2 new hangers for the rear ones (that bolt to the Milltek exhaust based on year of car) that were 1 piece and firmer rubber with custom bent hangers rods.
I said, I just want this fixed once and for all so let's do it. $100 and now my tail pipes are still dead center after a bunch of driving. Yeah!
Good for you that you have a muffler shop that are willing to make it right. All these aftermarket mufflers are like this and the Mini is very picky that it must be exact and these mufflers are seldom. They are poorly made from one sample of "test car" and became the gold-standard production jig. Milltek is no different. The JCW will fit right the first time but they are heavier and I infer being more restriction. And don't get me started with the boutique chrome tips that you have to buy separately.
