On my 90 Honda Civic LX I noticed the muffler & tailpipe are shot. (stock system). I want to have it replaced. I was thinking of having a glass pak or turbo muffler installed going from the 1.5" pipe to a 2" muffler with a 2" tailpipe.
I want a little noise not too much. Do you think I will loose any bottom end torque?? Could I see an improvement in mpg?
Does anyone have a better idea? I'm not going to buy an catback system I'm going to have the muffler shop build whatever I end up with. The shop I'm going to is one that I'm friends with the owner.
Thanks,

 

Glass pack mufflers are very loud. When the stuff in the back rots out, the center pipe will not be far behind, so replace everything after the converter now while you're at it. I'd just use stock type parts that are slightly larger. The Civic engine has no low end torque to begin with. With the DPFI system and non-VTEC engine don't expect much performance.

 

Thanks for your response. The front muffler is a little round bullet type? Just from looking under the car & tapping on what isn't shielded the pipes forwards of where the muffler sounds pretty solid. I will have the muffler shop confirm that.
Yea I agree no low end torque that is why I didn't want to open up the exhaust too much. The more free flowing it seems that you loose low end torque. The little Honda has plenty of top end speed. It gets to 100 mph with little fan fair on the level.
Yea glass paks can get loud, but I thought if I was able to keep everything stock to the muffler & had like a 28" pak it would give it a little noise but not too much. But maybe going turbo would be better. Add a Magnaflow turbo muffler? Then I wanted to go 2" on from the muffler for one it looks better than that little 1.5" pipe. One thing I notice is you don't see too many 1990 Honda four Sedans running around. I was in Las Vegas a few weeks ago & a young guy pulled up next to me with an older Honda & rapped his pipes & took off. I was already doing 75 mph & didn't feel like a freeway race. I'll post what we end up with & how it sounds & runs. I have to travel 75 miles to the closet muffler shop.
Thanks.

 

The bulge in the center pipe under the back seat area, just before it turns to the side, is a resonator. It changes the sound slightly but it isn't a muffler.

 

Thanks, Yea I have run vehicles with no muffler just the Cat & they sounded OK, as long as the Cat was in good shape. But these 4 bangers at high RPM can get loud. This Honda with an automatic runs around 3000 RPMs @ 67 mph.
I went to Uniroyal All Season tires from Kumho KR21 & they are a a way better tire for the same money. We wore out 1.5 sets of Kumhos in 35,000 miles. I rotated every 5,000 except for the two I wore out in 19,000 miles. Just a side note.

 

Well I ended up with a turbo muffler & new tailpipe. Went from 1.5" to a 2.0" muffler then out with a 1.75" pipe. The rest of the system was OK. The muffler was plugged up from being burned up. My gas mileage went from 29 mpg to 35 mpg & I notice an improvement in power also.