Mr Jokster

iTrader: (8)

kamlung

iTrader: (8)

THANKS!!!

gaskets are sold on Amazon for anyone that needs them...

i wonder if instead of the nuts and bolts from Lexus, I can just go pick up some stainless steel from Home Depot... won't have to worry about corrosion for next time? has anyone done this instead?

Mr Jokster

iTrader: (8)

Yea thats fine, but make sure you get some grade 8 bolts so they can handle the heat.

kamlung

iTrader: (8)

2nd gasket arrived yesterday... so i'll attempt to tackle this tonight/this week... i'm hoping i can break the old nuts and bolts loose without having to cut anything... usually they are seized on from all the snow/salt we have up here in the northeast... :fingers crossed: but i never seem to have good luck working on exhausts...

kamlung

iTrader: (8)

the gasket seems to have a protrusion in it... i'm assuming this is to position it in the exhaust correctly... does anyone know if this faces up or down?

so the driver side which was leaking, i managed to get the bolts/nuts off after fighting for about 20 mins... LOTS of PB blaster since i ran out of Kroil... but of course you need to undo the passenger side to drop the whole Y-pipe anyway... bottom bolt came off about as easy as the two on the driver side... but of course when i got to the last bolt (there is always one @$$hole in every group), it would not budge... ended up rounding the bolt... by then it was about 7PM at night and starting to get dark... i put on 3 new bolts to connect the y-pipe back up so i could drive to work today... had a quick dinner and ran to Sears to buy a impact grade bolt extractor... hopefully this will work before i have to resort to cutting off the bolt... i was so mad that i was so close to actually having a successful exhaust job... all well... its raining today so will see if i can try to get to it tonight, otherwise i'll be driving around with a now bigger exhaust leak for a few days...

top tip for anyone that is doing this themselves... the outer bolts are obstructed by the post cat O2 sensors on the Y-pipe... you won't be able to fit the socket and impact on without an extension... if you don't want to risk damaging the O2S when working in the area (like say if you have to hammer a socket on the bolt) take the sensor out and wrap it up and away... but that will require you to disconnect the O2S from inside to be able to spin it off... alternatively, i used a stubby socket and breaker bar to first crack the bolts loose, then zipped them off with the impact and a flare wrench on the nut side to get as much bite as i could... the bolts are normally 14mm... after 14 years of corrosion, my 14mm bolt became 13mm as that was the socket size i ended up hammering on...