I installed SPD exhaust adapter this weekend myself

[xrocket21]

I did these on my truck last week. I didn't touch the downpipes at all. Remove downpipe nuts, slide down pipe flanges, remove studs, slide out OEM turbo adapters and slide in SPD ones.

Stud removal was a fight and torch is a necessity.

FYI I'm a GM World Class technician, so finding shortcuts is how I make my money lol

I could totally see it being possible to do it not removing them, but I knew the studs would be a fight and I wanted more space to work.

Nice work doing it with the downpipes in place!

Glad you agree on torches being a necessity! Honestly, mine came right out easy peasey once I heated the flange.

 

[xgardx]

Let me start off saying it was a brutal install!!! The adapters are pretty accessible, except for all the stuff you have to remove to get the downpipes out of the way!



Next, I unbolted the downpipes at the adapters, and loosened the rest of the downpipe connections.

At this point, I tried to wiggle the downpipe, back, around, up, down, etc, but I just couldnt get it out of the way sufficiently. I think it is possible to do without the next step, but I decided to fully drop the downpipes.

To do this, I had to support the tranny with a jack, and then unbolted a few heatshields, and dropped and removed the tranny crossmember.

At this point, now that the downpipe was free, and its a BITCH of a piece as both sides are welded together, I realized I only unplugged 3 of the 4 02 sensor wired, so I had to hold the pipes up one handed while I struggled with the last plug with the other hand.

.

where did you jack/ support the tranny to safely remove the cross memeber?

i tackeled installing the SPD adapters and the SPD catted downpipes this week in the home garage jacked up same as you ( wheels on though) could not get factory DP out, started to try to remove cross member but then became too worried when i could only find a decent jack surface on the transfer case, so i stopped with that route fearing strain to the drivetrain components and just resorted to cutting the factory downpipe a little past the cats on each side to remove everything.

now i'm not certain if i'm happy with the sound of the truck / exhaust on wide open throttle... there is quite a bit of rasp to it and took away from hearing the turbo spool with just my CAI that i highly enjoyed. that or its a fittment issue, only does it while in gear/ underload, doesn't rasp really when it is revved in neutral.

but to reinstall the factory DP i know i'm going to have to pull that cross member to get it back in place.