Hi I just got a 95 Maxima with an Injen cold air intake, H&R coil springs, and a Progress rear sway bar. Runs great! but I want more.... I hear that a y-pipe upgrade is a good bang-for-the-buck upgrade, but I live in California where regulations on smog and street-legality are rough. Can I upgrade without failing smog? And what size pipe should I get? For me, performance> noise, I actually like having a sleeper.

 

A ypipe only eliminates the precats. Just be sure to bring your car to the smog shop nice and hot. Go for a 20 minute drive before arriving. You'll pass emissions no problem. Just don't go to a shop that will do a very thorough visual inspection.(99% of shops don't look under the car)

All ypipes are about 2.5". Lookup Warpspeed or keep your eyes open in the classifieds.

 

Ok, that's good to know, now I just need to find a good manufacturer (Warpspeed doesn't ship to California :/ ) One more question: what's the difference between a cat-back exhaust and a y-pipe exhaust? I hear people talk about both but I don't really know the specific details.

 

Warpspeed doesn't ship to CA?

Ypipe is from the headers to the cat. Catback is everything after the cat to the tailpipe.

 

Oh ok got it

Um more to the point: Warpspeed does not ship the 95-99 Maxima Y-Pipe to California. Just my luck they pick on my gen lol

 

Have it shipped to schmellyfart (Leonard) in AZ. Cool guy that can be trusted. He'll then ship it to you.

 

Right. Anything that deals with pollution has to be done by a licensed repair shop.

Unless it got changed in the last year or so, auto parts stores aren't allowed to read check engine codes. You have to go to a licensed repair shop for that and it isn't necessarily a free service.

 

Would an installation of the warp-speed y-pipe change the exhaust note with an OE (or equivalent) muffler?
Also, I like how a shipping alternative was offered to the OP, that's teamwork.

 

Yes, you will hear a difference. It is not a major difference, but there is one.

 

We typically try to avoid shipping to California because the pre-cats are eliminated, we prefer to ship to an adjacent state where they are a little more legal. Of course if you tell us it is for off-road use only..................

We recently had to change flange suppliers because our current supplier quit making them for the 1989-2000 Feds, we had one of our other vendors make up a batch of laser cut flanges and we expect them around the 26th of this month. They will ship a little faster at that point.

regards
Dallas
WarpSpeed Performance

 

Thank you everyone for all the help, I appreciate it.

Now that you mention it, I actually need this for off road use only!

One last question: will switching to a high flow cat cause smog issues? I'm assuming it does

 

You'll still pass with a high flow cat. Not by much, but you'll still pass.

 

this is a very informative thread because I was wondering the same thing about exhausts. I got lucky in passing emissions in Cali since Im from NY. I wanted to eventually do some work but wasnt sure on how to go about it. I just look for threads and read