customer review: Ark DT-S exhaust

MJB

Hey guys, just wanted to do a quick review for the new Ark DT-S exhaust system. For those who haven't heard, this exhaust was just released a couple weeks ago. As you can see from the pictures, craftsmanship is top notch. Installation was easy... I was able to do most of the install by myself with the car being on jack stands in my driveway. The only part I needed help on was the rear muffler part as it is pretty heavy. No fitment issues whatsoever. Everything lined up like its supposed to with no adjustments needed. Install time was about 2 hours. If you have this done at a shop with a lift, can easily be done in 30minutes to an hour.


The burnt tips look awesome. They are adjustable as well.


One reason why I wanted this exhaust was because of the ground clearance. As of right now, I'm lowered with Tein springs and as you can see, this is a lowered car friendly exhaust. I have BC coilovers which I plan on installing asap and have no worries about scrapping or clearance issues.




Ok,driving impressions... A little on the quite side. It does have a very deep tone to it, however it is not much louder than my stock Nismo exhaust. So I decided to cut out the resonators today. Wow, huge difference. Startup, idle, normal driving is mostly the same, but when you open it up it really comes alive! Not annoying or obnoxious loud, very exotic, deep sounding. No drone either which is always nice. Don't get me wrong, even with the resonators installed it sounded really good. Its just that I'm still running with stock cats and was wanting an exhaust on the louder side. Plus, this exhaust is about as heavy as stock, so by cutting out the resonators I was able to shed around 10lbs. Now most of the weight on this is in the rear, which works out perfectly since I wanted to add some weight in the back end anyways. I do feel extra power judging by the butt dyno. I had an Agency Power CBE installed before this one, which is true dual without a X or H pipe, so I felt like I lost some tq in the lower range with that setup. With this new exhaust having a X pipe configuration, I can definitely feel that I gained that tq back and then some. I'm going to get a tune after I install my HFC's here in the next couple weeks so I should have some dyno results. Sorry, I don't have a baseline dyno nor do I have my stock exhaust with me, so maybe I can do a comparison with this vs my AP cbe and see if I really did gain anything.
All in all, I'm happy about the purchase.

I wasn't able to get a video of the exhaust prior of the resonator removal.

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09 Nismo #0483 sold. Viper or C7 next time around.