Stainless Steel Performance Exhaust (cut/sleeve or weld)

Hi all,

I recently bought a used allisport intercooler for my TD5. The lovely chap was also selling his 'Twisted Performance' exhaust. So obviously, I bought both. I did some quick checks and although they were both off a 2.4 Puma, I was happy the intercooler would definitely fit and so would the exhaust (with some fettling).

The difference in exhaust is the stud pattern/shape where it fits to the manifold. The TD5 is oval/triangular with 3 bolts and the puma is square 4 bolt. I was hoping that the join on the down pipe to centre section would be the same as mine. Nope.

So, the question is;

Am I better cutting both (somewhere down my downpipe) and welding on somewhere on the middle section of the 'new' exhaust.? Or, cut both and use a stainless steel 'sleeve' type joint? Or is there something else?

Cheers in advance...

Just to justify, I got both a good price and my exhaust needed some welds in the last MOT and I can put my fingers through a hole in the tail pipe (plus it compliments the other mods)

I don't profess to being a welder (my welds look like seagull poo), but I was involved with a lot of stainless pipe welding a couple of years ago (not on the tools!!). I did learn that to successfully weld stainless pipe, you need to purge the air from inside the pipe and maintain a positive argon pressure inside the pipe - but not too much pressure as it pushes the weld filler out - and argon arc welding. If you have access to this process, go for your option one. Otherwise sleeve the pipes with the sleeve on the outside and argon weld the ends of the sleeve (eliminates the need for purging).

Sleeve and mig it.
Plenty strong and only the weld will go rusty and I suspect you'll need a new chassis before that becomes a problem

Stainless flex sections off of ebay are good, the ones with the long tails makes life easier, normal mig welder with normal steel mig wire works just fine, its what I did with my stainless system.