Tensioner Good, Exhaust Bad

[spewey at comcast.net (Spewey)]

Bryan Rankin wrote:

> Brought it home, and the old man was positive it needed a flex pipe. 
> What do you guys reccomend I do?

This is tangentially related to the 16V downpipe issue.  That system
flexes on springs on the dp and a ball joint exh connection right in
front of the cat.  The lowly toilet bowl 8Vs flex at the toilet clamp
joint.  MkI &etc. have that lovely corrugated foot-long flex tube that
doesn't come stock bigger than 1.5" or whatever and FLAPS knock-offs are
definitely inferior metal and not a good solution anyway.  I would love
to hear the current state of the art on solving this matter from the pros.

If the exhaust is attached to the engine rigidly, it is essentially a
big lever and Archimedes taught us that those are powerful.  Somewhere
it will eventually break so the old man is right again--you need a flex
point.