I installed the 2FG parts today. It took about 2 hours, no lift.
At work I deal in facts and evidence, so here’s what I observed.
At start up, the db meter showed a max of 94 db, settling into a 79 db reading taken with the meter on the ground at the trailer hitch position, 1m behind the truck.
Inside the cabin, before, with stock exhaust:
at 60mph in top gear, no radio, fan or other noise other than road, wind, motor and exhaust 66.5-67.5 db.
At 60mph top gear, no radio, fan or other in cabin noise: 70-71 db.
That’s about 7 on the volume setting of the Sony stereo, probably quite similar for b&o. 8 or 9 is where I listen to news or traffic with the windows up.
For both tests i had the db meter in the front cup holder.
Less tangible observations:
1) Wife immediately noticed how much louder the truck is, particularly taking off from a stop even at light throttle. She warned me that we couldn’t sound like the high school kid in the beat up Mustang or no muffler mazda6 that loves our street hearing his exhaust bounce of our houses. No worries on that front.
2) No observable reverb or poor quality sound introduced by the exhaust.
3) lugging causes a very low pitch hum (duh!) that’s more noticeable now. think stuck in 10th gear at about 40-44 mph and trying to slowly accelerate at about 1200 rpm on the tach
I was a little surprised at how much louder 2fg is. Not disappointed, just a little surprised. Fortunately, it’s civilized enough to hold a conversation at 60. I need to have a go in sport mode to see if the volume increase is closer to linear or proportional to throttle.
suggestions: you need a metric socket set, driver. AWE instructions are quite adequate, with good pictures. if you’re on the ground, a floor jack under the truck muffler is suggested. The muffler is heavy but the instructions over play this. it’s not -that- heavy.
definitely spray the daylights out of the clamp bolts and joints to be taken apart liberally with penetrating oil well before the install attempt. You might be tempted to be gentle with your 70 thousand dollar truck.
Don’t. You’re underneath it. it’s an off road oriented truck. it should be caked in mud. Nobody will ever see under there unless you’re mowing them down.
I suggest a BFH and a 2 x 4 and you will make much shorter work of separating the pieces. A 3 or 4 pounder, no bounce or similar implement should get things apart in a few smitings.
