Ark exhaust install and impressions

The Stinger exhaust swap is straight forward, probably easier than some other cars i have done. I did mine solo, on jack stands in my garage. There is a video on YouTube that is very good. The only thing i did that wasn't in the video was loosen one downpipe mounting bracket to get the CAT to rotate just a little to line up with the mid pipe.
Weight savings.... drum roll... 4.5 lbs! The mufflers are a little lighter and the mid pipe a little heavier. Basically a wash. Fit and finish and quality are excellent.

On start up, idle, and rev with no load, the exhaust is pretty tame. Before my first drive i thought it was going to be too quiet. Under load it gets louder and under WOT it sounds like a race car. Seems perfect to me. It is mostly drone free. I only noticed a bit on the highway @ 1800 RPM once. I could see it getting a little loud if you are lugging up a hill at low RPM. Cruising under light load at lower highway speeds it is pretty quiet.
Start up and idol are quieter than my Stock WRX was, which was loud (just at idol). But while driving the Ark is louder than the WRX which is sporty but not loud overall. The Ark on the Stinger does sound very similar to the sport exhaust on my GLA 45 AMG, which is very loud for a OEM exhaust.

The exhaust totally changes the character of the car so beware. Stock it is sports/ luxury almost Lexus like quietness. With the exhaust it sounds like a Maserati or Ferrari. Not quite that aggressive but heading that way. With the exhaust you don't need the fake engine sound anymore. I turned that down in custom.

 

I dont have my notes in front of me but from memory the stock was 56 lbs and Ark 52. I'll correct if i am off.
You do need the whole car jacked up as the CAT is mid car and those are the hardest bolts. I had room to use a crawler which helped on effort and neck soarness.

 

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Forgot to mention that in the Ark install video they reused the stock CAT gasket and i used the one proveded by Ark as it looked better quality

 

I haven't seen any power claims yet but should be as good as it gets with the mid pipe cross over and 45 degree bends going towards the mufflers. Probably 20 or 25 hp with the exhaust and K&N panels. I know it is psychological but the exhaust feels like it makes the car faster than the racechip did. I'm planning on hitting the dyno at Tork and do a few 1/4 mile runs in the next few weeks. Mine is AWD so we cant really compare to torks stock dynos. But I will do a run with RC off , sport and race mode. (My sport is set to 6 rather than 5.)

 

I replaced the Ark mufflers with Flowmaster DBX (Hush Power), attempting to quiet it down just a but more. Need to drive it more for the verdict. Quieter overall but the drone may be similar which is what I was trying to reduce. The Ark has a 3rd anti drone tube built into the muffler itself. Pretty slick. But that does reduce the baffles quite a bit.

 

The Ark has side mounted drone tubes on the mid pipe already as well as ones at the muffler.
The range of the drone is 1500-1900 and that has not changed much. The range does seem a little more narrow now maybe 1500- 1800. The drone is mild, not buzzy with either but just louder than the rest of the RPM range in a less audibly pleasing way. The Flow Master DBX is a little quieter over all so the loudness in the 1500-1900 does seem reduced. Probably didn't take the drone away but muffled everything a little more. The flow master is noticeably quieter above 2000. Flowmaster is deeper sound. Ark had a motorcycle, Indy car sound - very unique.

 

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