Some of us would appreciate it much. That original design is unique and many who were around at that time said they keep trying to find anything today that sounds like it, but with no luck. When you post it, also give us the muffler length and location were they are mounted.
Yes, the restriction would be noticeable and not just in sound. If you look at the smithy's picture, you can see that the chambers are in the outer casing without any inner tube at all. There will be turbulence and some restriction, but not like baffling and partially blocking the flow inside a straight pipe or inner tube of a muffler. And btw: I apparently like the idea of making your own mufflers from scratch, since I make whole instruments and amps the same way. Some of us care about unique sounds and others less - nobody is right or wrong - do what gets you excited and keep learning. I mostly have woodworking tools, but if I had the metal tools, I would go nuts and do all kinds of experiments with muffler sounds, as every car or truck should sound like it looks. To me that's more important than the color or quality of the finish. ...I know, an instrument maker talking to car guys and hot rodders .... haha....never mind...
Mid-eighties I built '64 Nova wagon with 10:1 327 and hyd. cam 230@0.050". I had ram's horns, 2" pipes, no crossover and one Thrush turbo muffler per side before rearend. I loved the sound. It wasn't too loud but nice tone. I didn't bark like glasspacks.
Since I saw that photo posted here many years ago, I wanted to hear the sound they make. Here is the rest of the photos. Somebody showed off this table-top display and I saved the images. This one has the perfect length I would use on my 235. I can add a soundclip of the custom Porters I had made for me a couple years ago, next time I come back from trip to town and everything is warmed up. They are quiet entertaining.
I have 27" Smithy's on the Deuce with 2" exhaust pipes and no crossover. 307 Chevy. Nice mellow sound at idle, good bark at full throttle, but kind of quiet at cruise. Perfect. I tried louvered cherry bombs, but they sound like crap. They don't attenuate those high frequencies enough. Perforated muffs on the very end of the system seem to be louder than those that have some tailpipe. A homemade muffler with a perforated core and either some stainless wool or fiberglass loosely packed between the core and the outer shell would sound good. don't stick stuff in the core. Any shorter than 24" starts to get loud, esp on the throttle. Maybe I'm just getting older, but I can't stand driving with loud mufflers or straight pipes anymore. I just really enjoy the thrum of the engine and being able to have a conversation with other folks in the car.
Couple of things here. I'm not sure it's really correct to call the current Smithy's "Reproductions" - Smithy's have been in production since the 1920's. In the 1950's they started building them with glass packing instead of the steel shavings. This was considered the newest and great technology, so they made the changes. Eventually the steel shavings were phased out. The company was bought out by the Late Ermie Immerso (3 Time AMBR winner) and he continued making them up until he sold his exhaust company's to PerTronix who rebranded most of his products as Patriot. We continue to build the Smithy as Ermie had, which is the way that they were making them when he bought it. So like many companies it is the same product under different ownership. The 2" inlet/outlet have a 1 3/4" core (not 1 3/8" as stated above).The 2 1/4 and 2 1/2" have 2 1/4 and 2 1/2" cores respectively for a deeper sound. If you look closely the first generation were also louvered cores, the louvers were just much wider and a little less tall, but still a louver. They also were "inside out" of the way most louvers are done today. The "sound" that the Smithy makes today is very close to those of the late 50's and 60's, but granted is different from that of the 20's to early 50's.
Thanks for the info. Yes, my Smithy's have 1-3/4" OD inner tube with modern glasspack style small louvers, leaving about 1-3/8" ID space in the center, between the louvers. Would be nice to have an early style edition with steelpacking and old style louvers and different lengths. That's the sound, I read over the years on various forums, that a lot of folks are looking for but can't find nowadays.
Update: I just noticed the original poster has deleted every post on this and all his other threads. Never the less, for those who are curious and have found this thread.... I actually found an original pair of 1950s 18" Smithy's packed with steel shavings. Had them now in my truck and chevy 6 for a few weeks. Very cool - together with the Porters these are the best sounding mufflers I heard to date, by far. They have an almost organic sound quality that is very distinct and unique. My truck of over 16 years, never sounded this good and alive, even with straight pipes. They sure sound very different from the current productions. Original Smithy's mufflers apparently still had steel shavings at least into the mid 60s, going by the application dates on the original packaging boxes. The inner core is a 1-3/4" tube with relatively few and small 1/8" perforations about 1/2" apart in 12 straight rows. Chambers on both ends are only 1". When you shake them, you can hear the shavings rattling just a little inside. The small perforations prevent the shavings from blowing out, but still allow just enough sound absorption and with less diffusion and turbulence than the modern louvered or the perforated types with larger open area.
i had a 72 nova 350 2 barrel and 3 speed in the floor and used thrush and skag pipes comeing out by each tire and it roared a lot, quite noisey, and dont drive over a curb, then i put on another muffler and pipe that was when i started college in 1980, had the back fenders cut out and wheel housings sticking out, used to rip he girls clothes in the parking lots!!!!
To those of you that requested a video of my Smithy's sound that I described above, go to this new thread. I didn't want to hijack this one.... Cheers... http://www.jalopyjournal.com/forum/showthread.php?p=7380138#post7380138
Here's one more addition to the "holes" idea. We ran Schoenfeld mufflers on our dirt car for years, and made some of our own inserts. Hit the holes HARD with a punch, to make longer "barbs", giving you more noise reduction. We only ran 6" - 8" muffllers, but we only had to get to 95 db. A 24" insert with lots of barbs could be a big help to make it (kinda) street legal. A pic from Summit: http://static.summitracing.com/global/images/prod/large/SCH-42530.jpg
I just finished a 66 nova with a ls2 6.0 I built all stainless headers and exhaust. The first set of pipes were true duals. They were loud and rasspy. They didnt sound good even with stainless borla mufflers. It has 2 1/2 exhaust front to rear. I went back and changed it to a x pipe that I built. It sounds SO much smoother and quieter even with the same mufflers. It also picked up 3 tenths in the 1/8 with no changes except x pipe. I would put a x pipe on it you will like it. Dan
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