I ordered my
borla w/ 3.5" tips on June 5th from Vivid Racing. Shipped from
Borla on 6/30 it arrived, via FedEx ground on July 8th. The price paid was $1500 including shipping.
No issues w/ the packaging - it arrived in one piece. With the July 4th weekend approaching, I'd hoped for a call from
borla or Vivid *before* it was sent to confirm shipping -- I wanted to switch to 2-day [and pay for that delivery service] so I could install it over that weekend.
That level of involvement / service was beyond all concerned -
Borla ships fedex ground, fedex ground is separate from their express services and the two don't talk, and Vivid took my payment and wrote a P.O. to
borla. Everyone Did Their Job.
The long lead time at
borla is more understandable and probably due to limited demand -- they make their $$ selling exhausts for mustangs, tundras, and suburbans ... our caymans are a small niche.
Borla sales told me on June 5th that a run of 5 was "in process" and 4 were spoken for. Unless you're lucky enough to find a stocking dealer, plan on a month delay. The build date on the shipping carton was "5/30".
[ I'd gripe some more about commerce in the internet age, except that I get far more options from amazon dot com -- even when I spend maybe 2% of that Vivid order ... ]
All in all, I did receive the exhaust.
Installation:
First a very
BIG THANKS to Gator Bite for his
articles on removing the stock exhaust and installing the
Borla. I wouldn't have attempted this job w/o them. many thanks!
The install was rather special, in part because I too broke a couple of exhaust studs. More on that later.
I supported the car on jack stands, and removed the rear wheels. I also removed a small plastic piece of trim from the wheel wells to get better access to the exhaust flanges.
The issue of the exhaust studs deserves special mention -- I applied several rounds of penetrating oil over a 2 hour period. I then automatically reached for my 13mm sockets and found those to be too large for some of the studs.
My CS is an early '06 -- an East Coast US car from a state which probably uses a lot of road salt in the winter ... either some of the nuts on the exhaust flange rusted down to 1/2", 12mm and 11mm, or, there was some significant variance in the nuts used @ Porsche. My CS' nuts were quite rusted.
At various times I was reaching for those size sockets, in 6pt and 12pt styles.
Rather than struggle with a short ratchet -- and apply some stud-snapping force in a bad direction, I found a longer breaker bar worked better. less side-side motion.
I learned this after snapping 2 studs on the driver's side. I made several attempts to create a stud press but had to resort to dremelling+drilling to remove most of the meat of the stud, down to the flange, at which point I drove them out w/ a hammer and punch. Perhaps these studs were spot-welded in - I found mention of this in other threads.
I replaced those 2 studs w/ 8mm stainless bolts, nuts and lockwashers.
when installing the
borla, the other 4 studs received new stainless nuts and lockwashers. All were treated w/ high-temp anti-seize.
"Other than that, Mrs. Lincoln, how did you like the play?"
Other than that, the removal of the stock exhaust was straightforward. The worst part of the removal was drilling out the 2 studs, kneeling on the garage floor ... pushing hard and watching drill bits turn red. Sadly I'm not so young any more.
Again, big thanks to Gator Bite -- it was especially helpful to be pointed to the 4 13mm bolts attaching the rear support cradle to the car -- *those* 4 and not the plethora of bolts used on the whole cradle.
-------------------------------
Borla install:
This too was straightforward, in spite of doing it myself. The suggestion of using a ratchet-strap was genius and really helped hold things together.
I put a moving blanket down under the car in case the exhaust dropped, got under the car, head pointed to the front, dragging the exhaust in behind me w/ my feet.
[OK, it would have been much easier w/ 2 people. My wife was at work ...]
I worked in stages side-to-side, arranging the
borla nearer to its mounting points, and then I seated the
borla's flanges on the exhaust studs, just enough to get 1 nut on each side. At one point I had to disconnect the right side assembly from left+tip to be able to position it.
Penetrating oil on the tip assembly help keep things loose enough to shift.
I then worked to get the 3 pieces of the assembly pressed together enough so that the distance between the rear mounting paddles was the same as the mounting bolt holes on the transmission. The ratchet strap was really helpful there.
When I succeeded getting it close in the rear, I attached 1 mounting bolt each side, and then started to muscle / press / pound / strap the exhaust onto all he exhaust studs. I then attached new nuts, finger-tight.
I repeated the process at the rear, installing lower and upper isolators and bolts, finger tight.
I then made a stab at getting the tip centered. When that was close, I tightened all the mounting hardware except the tip assembly clamps.
Lastly, I tapped on the tip assembly w/ hammer and block of wood to center the exhaust and then I tightened up the clamps.
Job done.
.
Linear Mode
