- This helped me narrow my choices down. Different people have
different requirements for a muffler sound. For me let me make it clear
, I was not looking for an extra loud/harsh sound. I wanted something
as close as possible to the kind of sound that comes out of the OEM 6L
Diablo. With only 10 instead of 12 cylinders clearly that was
asking a lot. To cut a long story short, I decided on the English
Quicksilver system. It sounded good on the web. They are a well
known manufacture and make excellent mufflers for many quality sports
cars. On top of that the price of their Gallardo system was half (or
more) that of some other systems. With some trepidation I ordered
a set on the web from England. To my delight It was at my doorstep
within a few days.
Figure 1 shows one of the two OEM Lamborghini and Quicksilver
systems. Quicksilver supply two muffler systems for the Gallardo. A
Sports system which I will describe first
and a louder Super Sports system which I
will describe later below. I was struck by the simplicity of the Quicksilver exhaust. It
was about 1/4 the weight of the OEM system. On top of that it was made
of really thick stainless steel. The joint welds were very well done
with no apparent weak spots. What I have below is an account of my
travels installing the system. This account is somewhat long and
more detailed than those in many of the other "repair entries" on this
web site. I have done this to help those that don't normally do repairs
on their car. The whole process took me about a day to do. However this
was because I was doing much of it for the first time photographing each
step as I went. Most DIY's should have no difficult following the
steps outlined below. If you are installing another type of muffler
in a Gallardo the process should be essentially the same.
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OK lets get started. First we have to remove
the cover over the rear part of the engine. This is done
by removing the screws around the edge of the cover (figure 2).
Don't forget the one screw at the front between the two air
filter housings. Also take care to store the screws in one pile.
We will have many similar looking screws in this process. It's
easy to confuse what screw goes where in the reassembly process
if they are all in one pile. A little bit of care starting off
can save much trial and error later! Figure 3 shows the
car with the cover removed. The OEM mufflers can now be clearly
seen. |
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Figure 2. |
Figure 3 |
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Next we
will proceed to remove the five honeycomb panels at the rear of
the car. If you carefully look at these you will see that there
are small screws holding them in place. These screws take an
"Allen wrench" to open. They have longer than you might expect
treads. I use a power-tool to speed up the process. Figures 4-5
shows steps in this process. The good news is that all the
screws are the same size. Remember each has a washer that can
easily be left behind and lost. |
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Figure 4. |
Figure 5 |
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Next we
need to disconnect the wire that is connected to the lights for
the rear license plate. The wire is held to the rear frame with
a clip as shown in Figure 6. This clip pulls away from the
frame. Further up along the wire (under the right brake lights
assembly) you will find a socket that allows you to disconnect
the cable. In my case I also had wires connected to the rear
radar detector and rear view camera. If you have not already
done so you should have these connected
via a socket as well. As
many times in the future you will have to remove the rear bumper
of the car. Also as shown in Figure 7 one of the two larger screws need to be
removed -- one on each side. |
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Figure 6 |
Figure 7 |
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Now we need to remove both rear wheels. If you cannot do that
yourself stop right now and go no further! We then remove the
rear part of each rear wheel housing. These are held in place by
a number of screws. They are of 3 different sizes so make a note
of which one goes where for re-assembly. All 3 types take Allen
wrench sockets. All screws are around the edges of the plastic
panel. Some are shown in Figure 8. |
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Figure 8 |
Figure 9 |
Figure 10 |
| Do NOT remove the ~6
aluminum screws in the center of each panel. These are used to
hold a heat insulation layer on the inside of the panel as seen
in Figure 10. Finally take care there are 2 small screws
at the bottom of the panel see Figure 9. |
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| Now we are at the
final stages of removing the rear bumper. First go along the
back removing the 6 screws as shown in Figure 11. There are 4
large screws underneath the bumper (the black portion that joins
it to the frame). Finally remove the larger bolt as shown in
Figure 12 that is on the side now seen with the wheel well panel
removed. After carefully removing all these screws the whole
bumper pulls away from the car. Pull out the sides first as
shown in figure 13. It is quite tight.
Pull the front portion directly outwards. |
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Figure 11 |
Figure 12 |
Figure 13 |
| Then work your way around
the back. The whole bumper is quite flexible. With care it is
really not possible to brake anything. After you pull the side
of the bumper out you will need to pull out the side indicator
light. It easily pops out. |
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Figure 14
shows the car with the rear bumper removed. All that remains is
the strong aluminum to which it was supported. It is not
absolutely necessary to remove this frame although the left side
has to be opened up (see below). If I were to do it all again I
would just take it off at this stage. You will see it is
connected to the rest of the car with just 4 large bolts and 4
smaller ones under the lights. |
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Figure 14 |
| We next need to remove
the heat shield over the muffler in the center of the car. Again
remove the necessary screws, Figure 15. Disconnect the tube that controls
the exhaust valves (see below) Removing this heat
shield is tricky. It is flexible and needs to be flexed to get
it out. It is shown in Figure 17. |
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Figure 15 |
Figure 16 |
Figure 17 |
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The OEM
exhaust is shown in Figure 18. We can see in Figure 19 where the
O2 sensor and exhaust access plug are situated. Both of these
need to be removed. |
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Figure 18 |
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Figure 19 |
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The
exhaust access plug simply screws out, figure 20.This plug is
used for OEM diagnostic tools to access the exhaust gasses and
must be inserted into toe Quicksilver muffler.
To remove the O2 sensor first we disconnect the wire lead
from its socket in the wheel well area, Figure 21. There
are 3 sockets in this area so be sure to disconnect the right
one first. |
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Figure 20 |
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Figure 21 |
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Now pull
the O2 sensor wire through the frame and into the engine area
Figure 22. Then carefully open the O2 sensor as shown in figure
23. In my car it was not real tight. I would avoid putting
things like "liquid wrench" on the treads as I have heard they
upset the O2 sensor when the car is restarted. |
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Figure 22 |
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Figure 23 |
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Figure
24 shows the removed 02 sensor. Carefully store it away
from oil rags etc. |
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Figure 24 |
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Now we
need to remove the C clamp that connects the OEM muffler tube to
the catalytic converter. This C clamp is shown in figure 24. I
unfortunately used a air powered wrench to open the screws and
broke one of the bolts. I put "Liquid Wrench" on the left hand
side, let it sit for 20 minutes and it opened with no problem.
Figure 26 shows the C clamp removed. |
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Figure 25 |
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Figure 26 |
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get the box out you also need to remove the small aluminum
bracket shown in figure 31. Then the whole box slides to the
side. The box is shown in figure 32. |
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Figure 30 shows the exposed OEM muffled muffler. We need to open
the C clamp shown in figure 31. With this opened the exhaust tubing
from the muffler box drops to the round |
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Figure 30 |
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Figure 31 |
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Figure 32 shows the exposed OEM muffler box with the exhaust
tubes removed. Removing the box itself is a bit tricky.
For the right hand side: by rotating the box it eventually
slides out. Figure 33 shows a side by side comparison of
the OEM muffler box and the Quicksilver box. I was amazed how
heavy the OEM box was. The Quicksilver box is about one quarter
the weight of the OEM box. |
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Figure 32 |
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Figure 33 |
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We now
will install the right hand Quicksilver muffler. First we
attach it via the C clamps to the catalytic converter, Figure
34. Do not tighten things up yet. Examine the flanges of
the muffled. As shown in figure 35 there was a slight dent in
mine. I bent this out with a pliers before continuing. |
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Figure 34 |
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Figure 35 |
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Now for a bit of a
side track! Each muffler has a valve that using the engine
vacuum line opens up at around 3000 RPM to allow both exhaust
tubes to exit gas. This is to comply with EURO sound restrictions.
I noticed that in my car (figure 36) that the right hand hose
was bent at an unnecessary angle. This can in time lead to hose
fatigue. I corrected this by opening the 3 small screws that
attach the valve to the frame and rotating the valve. See
figures 37 and 38. |
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Figure 36 |
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Figure 37 |
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Figure 38 |
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OK. Back to muffler installation. Figure
39 shows the car with a Quicksilver exhaust on the
right hand side and the OEM muffler on the left hand side. You
can see immediately how much smaller (and lighter) the
Quicksilver exhaust is. |
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Figure 39 |
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Now do exactly
the same thing for the left hand muffler. The only complication
here is that to get the OEM muffler out of the car there is not
enough room to rotate it and slide it out between the car frame
and bumper support. The Oil tank gets in
the way. You have to pull out the bumper frame a little to rotate the
muffler out. This is shown in figure 43 and 44. As I said above, next
time I would remove this frame completely at the start. |
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Figure 40 |
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Figure 41 |
| For
re-assembly all things go back pretty much as you would expect.
The only critical point is shown in figure 42. When you attach
the muffler tips it is absolutely essential to make sure the
muffler exhaust tube does not touch the tips. The exhaust tube
will vibrate with varying engine RPMs. There must be enough
space for this within the exhaust tip. Check there is at least a
1/4 inch distance all around. This is done by twisting and
turning the exhaust tubes and muffler box before tightening the
C clamp bolts. |
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Figure 42 |
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Figure 43 |
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There is a space on the wheel side of the insulation box to get
to the C clamps to tighten them up. See figure 43. For this
reason also be sure to have the C clamp bolts facing forward
before putting the insulation box back in the car. |
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| As I mentioned above.
It is very easy to snap off the C clamp bolts. They are double
treaded into the brass like material of the C clamp. If this
happens. Simply drill out the broken bolt and use a grade 7
stainless bolt of the right size to hold the C clamp together.
Use a washer and lock nut. This in my opinion is a stronger
arrangement anyway and is the way exhaust C clamps are done in
most cars. |
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Figure 44 |
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Figure 45 |
How does it sound.
It is difficult to describe sound differences for mufflers on cars.
As with music, it tends to be a very personal thing. I have here three
files that give the sound of the OEM and two Quicksilver mufflers on the above car.
Let me quickly say the sound from these files do not do either type of
muffler justice. I recorded the sound in a small confined garage with a
simple video camera. I cannot explain the grinding noise
(particularly for the OEM muffler). I think the microphone is sensitive
to different frequencies than that of the human ear.
From my perspective the Quicksilver sound is a modest increase in
aggressiveness over the Lamborghini OEM muffler sound. At low RPM it has
a bit more bight to it and at higher RPM (>3000) is begins to get loud.
I do a lot of long distance highway driving in the 2-3000RPM range. I
did not want a sound that would be annoying when driving for hours. That
being said, I still think the OEM Diablo muffler has a better sound.
Also I should point out if you want a muffler that will get a lot of
attention, wake up the neighborhood etc. this is not the muffler for
you. Quicksilver also make a "Super Sports
system" for people who are looking for something a little louder.
The Quicksilver Super
Sports Muffler.
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you can see in figure 46 the Super sports muffler is simply a
straight pipe. The end to end dimensions are exactly the same as
the Sports version described above. There is just no muffler
box. You might expect this to be very loud. But in fact
because the exhaust goes through the catalytic converter and down
this tube to be split by the constricted Lamborghini valve
described above, the sound is actually not too loud. It is
defiantly louder than the sports version however. |
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Figure 46 |
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Figure 47 |
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Installing this muffler is exactly the same
as described above. I enclose a two photographs of my
Gallardo with this system Figures 47 & 48.
I have driven with both systems and in the
end decided to stick with the Sports Quicksilver muffler.
This is a personal choice however. Both systems are well made
and a joy to use. |
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Figure 48 |
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