I'm looking to get a full borla exhaust with xerd header for my sc. I'm seeing mufflers all around but I'm guessing borla doesn't make a full exhaust for our cars. What have other guys used with this setup? Custom 2.5'' pipe bending is prob my cheapest option right? Also, about taking out the cats, will I loose more power due to the lack of back pressure or is that a myth?

2.25 mandrel is probably best if u are goin to take out ur cats. the back pressure helps ur lowend torque. Highend will benefit the most. Wut i would do is get the xerd header, custom 2.25in piping and keep the stock mufflers. your low end will take a hit, but it wont be too bad compared to ur high end power. And it'll sound good.

Is there a way to get the best of both worlds? Maybe keep the cats and get after market mufflers? I want more power without any loss

the set up i told you is a good compromise imo. Our stock mufflers are not a straight through design, so they prob help out w/ some of the back pressure, but if u want another setup, buy some straight through mufflers and add a cat if u wanna be smog effecient.

A restalled torque converter will take care of that.
I have Borla's with my resonators replaced with 2.25'' piping, and both cats still in place (for now anyway). And i just added a Lextreme restalled TC 6 weeks ago.
The exhaust sounds good, there wasnt really a noticeable drop in power on the low end , and there was a decent amount on the high end before the TC.
But adding the TC has really woken the car up . Especially from a stop.
But ive actually noticed a huge difference at all speeds. Even if i pussyfoot it ,I can feel it pull at every shift.

What about leaving the resonators and getting header and mufflers? Is that really doing nothin except adding style and sound? Is it a MUST to get rid of the resonators? If I had a choice I would just leave everything and go with mufflers and headers, input? The TC sounds like plan B but I was really hoping to do a 5spd conv this winter. I think that's the best upgrade for the tranny but i'm not sure if I wanna do that yet. If not TC is gonna be the way to go.

You can do straight piping and somehow have this part installed. http://www.raretrick.com/index.asp?c...roductsID=7483

I just put is a muffler delete exhaust. 2.25" tubing and it sounds really good. I am not sure about power gains though.

Oh i gotcha, If doing a 5spd conv. it would be silly to do the restall TC obviously.... I think the headers will make a bigger gains than the mufflers IMO.
I dont know what difference removing VS leaving the resognators would have been.( Probably minimal. ) I chose to remove them, because i was already swapping the mufflers. So i just went ahead and did the larger piping, and made it a catback.

Cool, well IMO i'm thinking mufflers comparitavly won't do much at all. The biggest gains here will be engine comp, headers, and tranny mods, intake and exhaust we're talkin style pts only