MAP Cat back Exhaust Review

Hello everyone, thought I'd post my impressions

Like many of you, after driving my Mustang for a while you start noticing things about your car and you do a bit of looking on this site. This is my first Mustang and even though I don't have a V8, I don't think it means my car can't have a little attitude of its own.

There are a lot of choices and videos to try to get an idea of what's out there. In my opinion you have three main groups: 1- deep rumbling exhaust 2. Louder version of stock exhaust 3. Race car orientated sound.

Once I heard MF, it had my attention and choice for a deep rumbling exhaust.

I chose MAP because they also have the same style exhaust, known quality, and Adam got me a great deal last December

First the quality. I took it in to a local place to get installed. I was thinking of installing it with a friend but sub freezing temps are less than optimal! The shop I took to was very nice and I noticed everyone looking at my car a the exhaust was being installed including the shop manager. I am a regular to this shop so I thought 'hey, they want to make sure it's done right'. Well that was part of it, they all were checking out the quality of the exhaust and were surprised how well it was constructed. Things like " yeah the first thing I saw were those welds!" and followed up by comments like "you get what you pay for"

Sound - now I did want to drive this for a while so the initial "holy crap!" excitement passed and I had some time with it. It's currently my only mod on the car and I can tell you it delivers on my expectations. Cold starts are so nice I find myself rolling the window down just to get the full effect of the low rumble!

Hit the gas, again another note from the exhaust letting you know the car is ready to play! Cruising, the car is well mannered, no drone, and quiet.

Loud? Real cold starts are an announcement! I measured my stock exhaust in 12 degree weather and it got up to 54 db. New exhaust with same condition registers 67.5 db! Yeah, she lets you know she has awoken. It's not obnoxious though, once warmed up its not as loud, but it still gives that nice tone. I don't want to be "that guy" so to speak with the exhaust that is trying too hard for what the car is and MAP's strikes the right balance. It's not a V8, but it's a Mustang.

Service - I have been in the service industry all my life and I have seen comments about people being happy with service. To me service isn't how nice people are when they are taking my money, it's how they handle things if there is an issue or question after you've taken my money. I had one small issue where I needed a part for my exhaust and it only took an email to explain and get resolved. YMMV but no issues from me and quite happy with them.

What you are missing in the videos is really the physical bass rumble that you feel when starting the car. It's kind of like trying to buy subwoofers by video. I even had the YouTube video hooked up to my high end HT and it came close, but the in person you have the full auditory and physical experience.

Hope this helps some of you. I know this isn't the first recommended upgrade on this forum, but for me this is one that puts a little smile on my face every time I get in and drive my car. And to me, muscle cars/sports cars, that's a big part of owning them.

Awesome review. I have the intake from MAP and couldn't be more happy with it. Hoping to finally get the intercooler put on next week and then I'll finally be getting Adam tuned shortly after.

I have the full map p1 kit + map FMIC and the tune Adam made for them while he worked there. I can tell you the quality and fitment of all parts was amazing and it's a whole new car performancewise. With the Catless downpipe the sound is basically perfect. Even a GT driver admitted to me that it broke his preconceptions that EBMs sounded like crap.

Cmw458 said:

Awesome review. I have the intake from MAP and couldn't be more happy with it. Hoping to finally get the intercooler put on next week and then I'll finally be getting Adam tuned shortly after.

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Thanks! Got to put the MAP intercooler in myself along with plugs. Just installed my JLT CAI this weekend and need to get everything done as well.

Glenn G said:

I have the full map p1 kit + map FMIC and the tune Adam made for them while he worked there. I can tell you the quality and fitment of all parts was amazing and it's a whole new car performancewise. With the Catless downpipe the sound is basically perfect. Even a GT driver admitted to me that it broke his preconceptions that EBMs sounded like crap.

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Hey Glenn, been thinking about downpipe but holding off. I'm interested in the sound it would add to the exhaust though...

Getting close to getting the tune!

I have the MAP cat back with Resonators, it is a very nice System.

Lexman said:

Hey Glenn, been thinking about downpipe but holding off. I'm interested in the sound it would add to the exhaust though...

Getting close to getting the tune!

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I posted some videos in my build thread but my phone cannot do the sound justice.

5.0yote said:

Here is my last Youtube clip of my exhaust, my car is running the MAP 5862 turbo kit, their 3"catless downpipe, and their cat back exhaust, I however have cut off their mufflers and welded on a set of Magnaflow Universal Street mufflers to help with the cabin drone because the map mufflers drone at all RPMs and speed in cabin which was a shame but it was expected considering the design. I will include my original clip with the stock MAP mufflers and the new setup for comparison.

Original MAP exhaust skip to like 2:40 in the clip


New setup with Magnaflow mufflers (3:54 in the clip has a good pass by from behind shot has a great growl to it)


I put a lot of time, energy and money into this spring project I hope you all can appreciate it as much as I do. There is something about modding my car that makes it that much more enjoyable, that is why I value forums like these. I hope these videos are helpful to someone looking for the right fit.

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While MAP seems have all the good feedback on their cb, 5.0yote said the system drones as hell...? It starts to make me hesitate to go with MAP turbo back. Anybody wants to clarify?

desperatev00 said:

While MAP seems have all the good feedback on their cb, 5.0yote said the system drones as hell...? It starts to make me hesitate to go with MAP turbo back. Anybody wants to clarify?

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Unfortunately the drone is gonna be there on MY, MBRP and MAP. Comes from the downpipe upgrade. Map had the resonator option but you can always add a Vibrant resonator to your exhaust of choice which helped me a lot.

Blyman93 said:

Unfortunately the drone is gonna be there on MY, MBRP and MAP. Comes from the downpipe upgrade. Map had the resonator option but you can always add a Vibrant resonator to your exhaust of choice which helped me a lot.

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I did the exactly same thing on my EB. The Vibrant Ultra Quiet helps decrease the drone for 50% but it's still there. Probably due to the small mufflers of the Race version.

Probably will go with MAP/Full-Race, still hesitating which way to go. Full-Race has a huge resonator which might help dampen the cabin drone.

desperatev00 said:

I did the exactly same thing on my EB. The Vibrant Ultra Quiet helps decrease the drone for 50% but it's still there. Probably due to the small mufflers of the Race version.

Probably will go with MAP/Full-Race, still hesitating which way to go. Full-Race has a huge resonator which might help dampen the cabin drone.

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On the stickied exhaust thread, someone was saying that the Full Race Race version had an incorrect picture posted and so the resonator on it was way smaller than the one in the picture. I would be careful about that because he got the race version and said it droned too much for his liking. Just wanted to warn about that guys experience.

Edit: They are posts 1851 and 1857 on the exhaust thread.

SleepyPony said:

On the stickied exhaust thread, someone was saying that the Full Race Race version had an incorrect picture posted and so the resonator on it was way smaller than the one in the picture. I would be careful about that because he got the race version and said it droned too much for his liking. Just wanted to warn about that guys experience.

Edit: They are posts 1851 and 1857 on the exhaust thread.

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Thanks for the head up. I will definitely go with Street version if I decide to go with Full-Race

After all the research online and self experience I found the drone is so subjective and depends on personal preference. Just pray for good luck when placing an order.

desperatev00 said:

Thanks for the head up. I will definitely go with Street version if I decide to go with Full-Race

After all the research online and self experience I found the drone is so subjective and depends on personal preference. Just pray for good luck when placing an order.

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I picked up the agency power exhaust 2 months ago and I can definitely say that drone is subjective. You also have to consider that everyone selling their exhaust system will say that it has little to no drone in order to get you to buy it. The only way to really gauge how much drone it has is for you to actually listen to the car in real life.

Anyways, other than that little ramble, upgrading the exhaust will more than likely create some drone with any aftermarket exhaust. My advice would be to drive for a couple hundred miles until the exhaust breaks in and if it's still too loud, disconnect the rear ANC mic in the headliner.

SleepyPony said:

I picked up the agency power exhaust 2 months ago and I can definitely say that drone is subjective. You also have to consider that everyone selling their exhaust system will say that it has little to no drone in order to get you to buy it. The only way to really gauge how much drone it has is for you to actually listen to the car in real life.

Anyways, other than that little ramble, upgrading the exhaust will more than likely create some drone with any aftermarket exhaust. My advice would be to drive for a couple hundred miles until the exhaust breaks in and if it's still too loud, disconnect the rear ANC mic in the headliner.

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Agree, but the point is that, sometimes we don't have chance to hear them in person, so that we will likely make some expensive mistakes buying drony exhaust.
I see Mustangs on the road every day, but I really have no idea if there are local events to gather Mustang owners together. So it's really hard to make a good choice.

SleepyPony said:

I picked up the agency power exhaust 2 months ago and I can definitely say that drone is subjective. You also have to consider that everyone selling their exhaust system will say that it has little to no drone in order to get you to buy it. The only way to really gauge how much drone it has is for you to actually listen to the car in real life.

Anyways, other than that little ramble, upgrading the exhaust will more than likely create some drone with any aftermarket exhaust. My advice would be to drive for a couple hundred miles until the exhaust breaks in and if it's still too loud, disconnect the rear ANC mic in the headliner.

Click to expand...

desperatev00 said:

Agree, but the point is that, sometimes we don't have chance to hear them in person, so that we will likely make some expensive mistakes buying drony exhaust.
I see Mustangs on the road every day, but I really have no idea if there are local events to gather Mustang owners together. So it's really hard to make a good choice.

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The situation is actually worse than merely subjective. My exhaust changes tone based on temperature, humidity and barometric pressure.

For example on a long road trip, if traffic is light, I'll set my cruise control at 100mph (160 kph) and if it's a warm day, it's fine. on a cold or rainy day it gets boomy and droney in that range. On my trips to the alps, crossing the fernpass the car is really quiet, even on ther rare occasions I can gun it. in that thin dry,cold air it's a-bit raspier.

the rest of the time when i'm out and about like in Switzerland or Austria, (120kph speed limits or around 75 mph) the car is perfectly livable and tone is mellow when cruising and good when getting up to speed.

Just to remind everyone, I have the MAP resonated exhaust and Catless down pipe. Amazingly, the car is actually quieter with the Vargas stage 2 + turbo! I was expecting the opposite TBH.