Continuing on from where I left off last time I have welded on a two further 45 degree bends, one to direct the exhaust up and then a second to return the exhaust horizontal into the rear silencer. This was getting a tad cumbersome to constantly remove, tac weld, fit again then fully weld however it’s all fairly straightforward fabrication and is really looking good. I have added a support bracket just before the first 45 degree elbow and this is bolted under the floor pan and has a rubber anti vibration rubber mount between the bracket and the exhaust. There naturally will be flex in all this with the rotational torque of the engine.
I still need to remove all this again and paint the brackets etc.. but it’s bloody freezing in the garage this time of year, so tasks like that will have to wait until warmer weather. So now I have one bracket supporting the exhaust and I need to make a second bracket to support the rear silencer. I have firstly made a small bracket out of some 2mm steel and welded this to the bottom of the silencer. This will also take a rubber bobbins mount to reduce the vibration and give the flexibility required. The supporting body brackets made from 5mm flat bar steel need to be slotted in order to give the ability to remove the exhaust if required.
Onto the rear bracket and this has been significantly harder to make. I had an idea of how it needed to be so I just systematically worked away making lots of small adjustments before welding the whole thing solid. I also have had to cut a slit in the rear body quarter for the mount to stick through and the rubber mount to fix onto. The bracket bolts through the boot floor and when fitted it’s extremely solid fixing point for the rear silencer. Again the cosmetics will have to wait until it’s a tad warmer and I’ll dress off the welds also to keep it looking good. I will seal the slot in the body with some PU sealant but again that will have to wait until the bracket is painted and final fit first.
I’m really really pleased with how this is coming together now. My only gripe is that I would love to have been able to make it all in stainless steel, however I have to work with the tools I have available and my capabilities. I did previously make some enquiries with a few fabricators getting this done in stainless steel however the prices were coming in at close to two thousand pounds which is hugely over my budget and just not affordable. As it stands now the full exhaust system has probs cost in the region of £200 so I can’t be upset about that really and I am really happy with it so far. My final touch is to make two sheet steel cones to taper off the silencer onto the pipe work, and also a tail piece finisher which I’m extremely specific on how I want it to look. This I will potter away with over the Christmas period and should be able to sort for less than £20 of steel. So that should be the next update.
The side profile is looking bloody fantastic in my opinion and I’m very happy to have built an exhaust system that looks like I wanted it to all by myself and hopefully will sound good also, it should be significantly louder than the original Spitfire exhaust because of the reduced size of the rear silencer but overall performance should also be acceptable because I haven’t really deviated from the overall length and diameter pipe used on the Spitfire…. Fingers crossed.
Probably going to be new year before I update again…. Busy time of year coming up and bloody expensive also! Here is a little video walk round of the exhaust for you to enjoy. See you in 2026!!
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