AA EL sounds terrible in my setup…

[ZeusyZeus]

What’s up my bimmer buds not trying to bring up another holy war in here but Long story short I have a 2019 F83 that came with a MPE. I liked how it sounded but I wanted it louder. Put on an active autowerke equal length unresonated midpipe and I liked the sound but the drone was unbearable. The rasp I could live with and the pops were crazy loud but the drone hitting that 1500-2000 RPM range was brutal. Additionally the pipe kept hitting the side of the car as Active never installed it correctly and I had to every so often take it in to get “tweaked” which made it super annoying. So I ended up putting back the stock mid pipe after getting tired of it. Now I’m regretting that because I don’t have the same loudness. I’ve been contemplating a single pipe. Anyone with experience with this have a suggestion? Starting to get expensive swapping out the pipe so many times.

[michael1284]

Full valvetronic setup

[M3SQRD]

I’m running the AA midpipe and AA axle-back 3-can muffler. Zero drone and zero rasp. For a S55, I think it sounds great. It makes it have a smoother sound that builds with rpm. Single midpipe also shifts the power curve to the right by 20-30 whp (I could detect the difference because I use this one section of barely used road to assess power-related mods. Times were consistently lower by 0.5-0.75 sec and top speeds were 3-4 mph higher before having to brake. I highly recommend the AA single midpipe (not one of the exact copies floating around out there. One vendor basically says his copy of the AA single mid because they use superior SS and their welds are also superior to AA. I asked for a copy of the material certification showing which 300-series SS they are using. Received nothing. Don’t state your blatantly copied AA midpipe is better but won’t provide info showing they actually use superior Chinese SS. BTW, AA welds are excellent. I’ve had mine for eight years so far and it still looks brand new but with a different patina.

[ZeusyZeus]

Originally Posted by M3SQRD

I’m running the AA midpipe and AA axle-back 3-can muffler. Zero drone and zero rasp. For a S55, I think it sounds great. It makes it have a smoother sound that builds with rpm. Single midpipe also shifts the power curve to the right by 20-30 whp (I could detect the difference because I use this one section of barely used road to assess power-related mods. Times were consistently lower by 0.5-0.75 sec and top speeds were 3-4 mph higher before having to brake. I highly recommend the AA single midpipe (not one of the exact copies floating around out there. One vendor basically says his copy of the AA single mid because they use superior SS and their welds are also superior to AA. I asked for a copy of the material certification showing which 300-series SS they are using. Received nothing. Don’t state your blatantly copied AA midpipe is better but won’t provide info showing they actually use superior Chinese SS. BTW, AA welds are excellent. I’ve had mine for eight years so far and it still looks brand new but with a different patina.

Awesome thanks for this. Did you try the EL midpipe or only the single pipe? I’m willing to give it a try and just sell my pipes right now. by any chance is the company you’re talking about VRSF? I was looking to try out their single pipe setup people seem happy with it.

[Danlnyc88]

When I purchased my first M4 many years ago, the most popular setup was downpipes + AA single midpipe + remus axleback. This was way before EL midpipes. I've had the same setup on two M4's and still have it on now. I still think it sounds great. Downpipes make a huge difference.

[ZeusyZeus]

Originally Posted by Danlnyc88

When I purchased my first M4 many years ago, the most popular setup was downpipes + AA single midpipe + remus axleback. This was way before EL midpipes. I've had the same setup on two M4's and still have it on now. I still think it sounds great. Downpipes make a huge difference.

Haven’t tried the single pipe just EL resonated and unresonated and damn was it raspy. They told me it’s because the muffle for the MPE is titanium so it’s extra raspy. Happy to hear you’re enjoying the single pipe man! Going to listen to some video clips online thinking about trying it myself now. Appreciate your input!

[Danlnyc88]

Originally Posted by ZeusyZeus

Haven’t tried the single pipe just EL resonated and unresonated and damn was it raspy. They told me it’s because the muffle for the MPE is titanium so it’s extra raspy. Happy to hear you’re enjoying the single pipe man! Going to listen to some video clips online thinking about trying it myself now. Appreciate your input!

they're right the axleback does make a difference, especially if its titanium. Different metals changes tone.

[M3SQRD]

Originally Posted by ZeusyZeus

Awesome thanks for this. Did you try the EL midpipe or only the single pipe? I’m willing to give it a try and just sell my pipes right now. by any chance is the company you’re talking about VRSF? I was looking to try out their single pipe setup people seem happy with it.

I have not tried any EL exhaust so I can’t provide a comparison.

It wasn’t vrsf but I believe their single midpipes are manufactured in the same facility. It’s easy to undercut the price of a completely copied design because you have no development cost to factor into the retail price. It requires zero skill, design and engineering abilities to blindly copy a design to the exact same geometry and the exact same thickness. I personally would still buy AA’s because they are the originator of this design.

[noemon]

Originally Posted by Danlnyc88

When I purchased my first M4 many years ago, the most popular setup was downpipes + AA single midpipe + remus axleback. This was way before EL midpipes. I've had the same setup on two M4's and still have it on now. I still think it sounds great. Downpipes make a huge difference.

I've got the same setup(Akra downpipes, VRSF midpipe, Remus back box), it's awesome.

Solved a little rattle on the Remus back box today that may help other people.

It was the washer on the mount(I forgot to take a picture but will take one next time the car is on a ramp), I thought it was the valve, we took it down, listened with a stethoscope, and we both listened the rattle coming from one of the valves but it wasn't, it was coming from a big washer on the side mount and we discovered it essentially by accident after massaging and knocking the entire thing for over an hour.

The sound however was indeed being transmitted to the valve area.

That was with Shaun Gosling from Gosling Racing:

https://www.goslingracing.com/

If you 're in the UK and you 've got car issues, you can see Shaun for pretty much anything. He's got a full setup with CNC machining, presses, the works, and can cut, weld, manufacture and CAD design from nuts and bolts to cages, or whatever one can think of. And work on M3 cars.

Superstar, went there today to collect seat brackets(that he manufactures) and came out with a mounted harness bar with trim holes cut to perfection, height re-adjustment & the exhaust back box removed, examined with a stethoscope, cut and rewelded all in 3 hours.

Bonus that it was me and him working pretty well together on the car from the get go in a massive unit full of M3's and CNC machines.

Paradise.

[Pewtinn]

I've run both AA single mid and EL. If you're going downpipe route (even catted), go single. If staying stock DP, EL sounds amazing. Even paired to the stock comp exhaust, it'll sound great without drone in the un-resonated form. I think the titanium in the MPE contributes to the buzzy sound as well. If properly installed, the midpipe shouldn't touch any part of the heat shielding (use their included AA brace as well). Here's a video that will summarize -

[ZeusyZeus]

Originally Posted by Pewtinn

I've run both AA single mid and EL. If you're going downpipe route (even catted), go single. If staying stock DP, EL sounds amazing. Even paired to the stock comp exhaust, it'll sound great without drone in the un-resonated form. I think the titanium in the MPE contributes to the buzzy sound as well. If properly installed, the midpipe shouldn't touch any part of the heat shielding (use their included AA brace as well). Here's a video that will summarize -

Thanks man very helpful. Yeah I had the EL unresonated which I just took off for the stock. I miss the loud pops but damn was it raspy. But to be honest the whole time I felt like the pipe was wrong or something. I only know that because even Active had a hard time working on it. I have a F83 shouldn’t have made any difference but maybe the pipe was defective and they just didn’t want to refund me. Who knows… wanted to try single. Watching the video definitely helped so thank you for that!

[jaycdynasty]

Originally Posted by ZeusyZeus

What’s up my bimmer buds not trying to bring up another holy war in here but Long story short I have a 2019 F83 that came with a MPE. I liked how it sounded but I wanted it louder. Put on an active autowerke equal length unresonated midpipe and I liked the sound but the drone was unbearable. The rasp I could live with and the pops were crazy loud but the drone hitting that 1500-2000 RPM range was brutal. Additionally the pipe kept hitting the side of the car as Active never installed it correctly and I had to every so often take it in to get “tweaked” which made it super annoying. So I ended up putting back the stock mid pipe after getting tired of it. Now I’m regretting that because I don’t have the same loudness. I’ve been contemplating a single pipe. Anyone with experience with this have a suggestion? Starting to get expensive swapping out the pipe so many times.

My current setup is stock DP, AA EL mid pipe non resonated and MPE exhaust which sounds amazing. Do you have a catless DP? From what I heard if you have a catless DP you are highly recommended to add back the resonator on the EL mid pipe.