The ultimate F50 exhaust project

Capristo building a full exhaust system for F50!

Hey everyone! We’re rather excited to announce that we have commissioned, on behalf of one of our customers, a full custom made special exhaust system for his F50 from Capristo.

This is a product that doesn’t exist yet, and so we’re working with Antonio, and the owner who has very specific requirements to get this exhaust perfect.

The car is currently at their factory being worked on so we thought we would document the process with a post here giving you an idea of what works and what doesn’t and a bit of an education when it comes to F50 exhausts, what the car has currently got, the build itself and finally the end result!

We've got lots to talk about so we thought we would start by talking about the F50 exhaust generally, we will follow that up shortly with a bit more about current aftermarket options before moving onto documenting the creation of our specific exhaust!

I look forward to hearing everyone's thoughts!

Dylan
Head of Tuning Sales


Overview


So, the problem with the F50 is that the engine was really never optimised for an "emissions homologated" exhaust system which would clean things up for road use. It’s now famous Ferrari lore, that the V12 started off in the 1990 Ferrari 641 F1 car but was actually developed and made ready for the F50 through the competition-only Le Mans prototype, the Ferrari 333SP.


641 engine
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333SP manifolds
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333SP engine
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The point is, the engine needed a LOT of exhaust to comply with EU noise/emissions regulations and Ferrari went too far.

From a tonal point of view, yes, the engine produces a nice “note” when you get the revs up but it’s very subdued for a car this wild. In entirely standard form, it’s far too quiet and you get rather almost none of the F1/333 SP type scream latent in the engine.

Here is an incredibly nostalgic bit of footage from the original Top Gear, featuring Tiff Needell in the 641 F1 car and a young Jeremy Clarkson in the F50!



YES, there is an argument that the car doesn’t need it’s exhaust enhanced - for those of you that have driven it you’ll know that the F50’s “stressed-member-engine-bolted-to-tub” configuration makes the car very noisy inside anyway, and that’s quite true. (The Carrera GT is similar car with a gorgeous exhaust note which is entirely sucked away, and a touch too quiet, so the driver hears almost none of it from his sports seated bolted to the carbon tub).


But the F50 was meant to be, in Di Montezemolo’s words, an “F1 for the road” and it seems a crying shame to not exploit what the engine can be made to deliver.


Some owners will say it sounds good enough – ok fine. We beg to differ.


And it should be made clear – this isn’t about waking the street and attracting attention – a lot of sports exhaust upgrade get negative press for that. This is about excitement – visceral enjoyment of the type which gives you an emotional connection to the machine – which is so essential to Ferrari and which is slowly being legislated away – in 20 years all these cars will be electric appliances, and make no mistake, we believe owners will yearn for elemental sound and excitement of Ferrari’s of yesteryear…..


It's not about VOLUME either. That’s easy – fit some hollow scaffolding to these engines and they sound absurdly loud. (we’re so sick of YouTubers talking about straight pipes!). We want an F1 NOTE – this car has to sound exciting and deliver a “nice” sound – not just volume.


And finally, yes – we’re also well aware that the F50 has become a multi-million-dollar car now. Many owners are insistent on originality, and that’s their prerogative of course – many owners have kept their cars standard and many more owners never drive them. But for those owners realise that we’re not on this earth forever (i.e. drivers) and those who want the ultimate sound for one of the exciting cars of all time, exhaust upgrades for the F50 have been developed by manufacturers and a LOT of F50’s have been fitted with them.
Remembering also, that these products are bolt on, non-invasive should give some comfort to those owners who are worried about an “irreversible modification.” That’s not what we’re doing…. The owner has the original exhaust and it can be refitted should the need ever arise. (which it won’t)



The Standard System VS an “Upgraded System


So that original system is made up for FOUR different sections:


1. Manifolds – which have catalysts
2. Huge Secondary catalysts – with a pre-cat lambda sensor
3. Link Pipes which travel through the rear suspension (wow!) which then connect to……
4. …..Some really heavy and restrictive rear valved rear silencers hung off the gearbox casing (again, wow!)


And for each of those sections you have the following options:


1. Performance cat-less manifolds
2. Cat-replacement pipes OR sport cats
3. A like for like link-pipe replacement as a pipe is pipe is a pipe.
4. Crucially either new rear mufflers OR a straight through rear section.


The Technical Details and Challenges:


The original manifolds are a restrictive, temperature generating, choking-with-backpressure mess – they need to come out. This engine CANNOT breathe with them in. We need a proper header.

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Next – look at those OEM catalysts. Only one pre-cat lambda per bank of the V12 – so they can easily be substituted for something more free flowing.


Finally, here are the stock silencers. They’re huge and you’ve got a really underwhelming exhaust sound.
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And here’s how a stock F50 sounds




The “note” is there, but the engine is doing almost 9000rpm! And those static revs at the start were a little disappointing to say the least…. (BTW – the whirring at the beginning are the cooling fans)!

Again, for owners who use their cars, they know exactly how underwhelming the OEM sound really is.

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So, what do you do? It’s too quiet and there are clear power gains to be had by replacing the choking OEM exhaust. So, you open the exhaust up. You change the manifolds, you de-cat (or sport cat), you fit either some kind of sport rear mufflers or you fit a straight through rear section.


But we do have an immediate technical problem.

Like the smaller 355, the F50’s engine doesn’t produce much torque at low rpm. Below 3000rpm it’s doesn’t do much apart from fizz and rattle and get you excited for what’s coming. Above 4000rpm it’s gets going, and towards the redline its positively mind blowing – typical peaky racer-engine stuff.

Here’s the issue: If we start fitting a “straighter” exhaust – equal length manifolds, no cats, and crucially no mufflers, the car will most definitely benefit from reduced backpressure. Really, that 4.7l V12 doesn’t need much, if any, backpressure at 8000rpm. (look at an old F1’ cars exhaust – there’s nothing there). And that’s great – more peak power at the redline. (and we haven’t talked about sound yet).


However, do that, (and we have tried) you lose torque at low rpm – and you can really feel it. Whereas you don’t need the throttle to pull the car away at all, you can just let out the clutch on the standard exhaust, fit a fully straight through system and the engine stalls – compared to stock, and it feels lumpy below 3500rpm and even idles roughly. This can be remedied by fitting mufflers on the car instead of rear straight-throughs. Do that and you give the engine a touch of backpressure, and it will now run a bit smoother and happier below 4000rpm.


A note on backpressure and backpressure scavenging: Scavenging is essentially the same process as slipstreaming the car in front of you in some ways: as each “pulse” of exhaust gas flows down the exhaust it leaves a small vacuum behind it – this vacuum helps to pull the next exhaust “pulse” through the exhaust system which in turn maximises efficiency within the exhaust. For this process to occur efficiently you need backpressure, and by reducing backpressure too much you can end up reducing the amount of low-end torque a car produces.


It’s worth pointing out that even on the stock system Ferrari recognised the need for torque at low rpm, hence they fitted “variable backpressure” rear silencers to the car. At low rpm/low “load request” the valves stay closed sending gasses through a quieter high backpressure channel in the mufflers. At high rpm the valves open and backpressure is reduced.

The point is the difference this makes to the overall backpressure is irrelevant. There are four separate catalysts in the F50’s exhaust – in the manifolds and upstream of the mufflers too. That’s where all the backpressure is. Tweaking it down by the mufflers isn’t going to make much difference to the way the car performs. It’s almost pointless.


And we haven’t even spoken about sound yet…...


Sound


So here’s what WE have found working from the back of the F50’s exhaust to the rear:

· Fit a new upgraded set of rear mufflers alone and you get very, very moderate difference in sound. Barely worth the expense if we’re honest.

· Fit a set of straight through exhausts alone at the rear and you get a very dramatic difference in sound. It’s a cheap upgrade and the car comes alive. It’s pretty loud. It’s not especially high pitched and you can’t feel any discernibly improvement in responsiveness at high rpm. And you’re looking at those ridiculous messy manifolds and cats which gets you thinking about the next step… (still, at least it’s not silent any more!)

· Add cat-replacement pipes to either one of the above and you exaggerate the sound difference of whatever you’ve chosen downstream. It’s hard to quantify but de-catting the car makes it maybe 20% louder still and the sound is becoming a little more racey – it’s not so smooth. It’s a bit more of rasp at high rpm now too. Interestingly the car feels more responsive and feels like it pulls stronger at high rpm.

By the way, the engine bay temperature has plummeted. The cooling fans don’t stay on for hours after you’ve finished your drive anymore…


Now add some performance manifolds to EITHER:

a) the mufflers and cat-replacement pipes.

The car still lacks that shriek of an F1 car and it’s still rather moderate of volume. Lots of bangs and pops of unburnt fuel flying out of the tailpipes. It’s perhaps the way that Ferrari should have made the car sound from stock. It’s not too loud by any means and it’s not all that exciting either…. It’s those pesky rear mufflers backing things up….

OR

b) To the straight throughs and cat-replacement pipes.

FINALLY, we get some of that F1-ish scream in the F50. The car is absurdly loud, all the time. At high rpm you can definitely hear shades of 333SP and old F1 cars and it really does tear at the air as it screams past. It’s an amazing, shocking sound. And it’s never ever quiet. Frankly, it’s too loud at low rpm, and when you drive out of your village, everyone knows you’ve taken the car for drive. It’s a little agricultural too when you’re not at full throttle, but it’s now spitting, kicking and shooting flames on every closure of the throttle. It’s STILL not F1 though – it’s not as high pitched and mellifluous as say an 812 with a sports exhaust. It’s more brute than motorsport…. And the car is a little grumpy now the entire exhaust is straight through…



And this last option is where we are today




This owner has the full exhaust but rotates the rear section between straight throughs and mufflers but regardless it still doesn’t sound close enough to Alain Prost’s 1990’ Ferrari 641 F1 car. (Video above is with straight throughs)


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So there you have it, a general overview of the OEM exhaust! We will follow this up shortly with some info on current aftermarket options, in the meantime let us know if you have any questions!

 

Hi all!

Hopefully the next chunk of info regarding what options there are currently will allay any confusion about the exhausts shown in the videos above,
Do let me know if you have any further questions as I'm more than happy to answer anything and everything you send our way!

TubiStyle – The tried and tested…


So which manufacturers products has everyone been fitting on their F50 - Tubi Style:


The manifolds built by Tubi’s contain no catalytic converters (unlike the original manifolds which have cats inside them). The test pipes simply replace the catalysts with straight through pipes.


Tubi manifolds/cats
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Now, on modern cars it is commonplace for cats to have pre AND post cat lambda sensors – they take oxygen measurements before & after and decide (based on the delta between the readings) whether the cat is operating as it should be. Removing the cats in such a car would instantly trigger a Check Engine Light due to an emissions related error code, that is not the case with the F50.

The emissions control system on the F50 operates just one emissions sensor per catalyst - as such you can simply take the cats out, get a great noise and more bhp without ANY technical implications * (bar torque considerations discussed above), and the cars ECU behaves as normal.

Tubi then offer the aforementioned silencer options: straight through section or baffled rear silencer.

Tubi rear silencers
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Image of Tubi rear silencer (courtesy of Vivid Racing)
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Image of Tubi rear silencer delete (courtesy of Girardo & co)
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Tubi rear silencer delete (Courtesy of Vivid Racing)
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Up until now Tubi have produced by far and away the best exhaust on the market, however there are a few issues with their system…



Issues to be solved with Tubi & Other Brands



Currently to get a good sound out of the car you need to go for the straight through rear section, however it is loud all the time due to lack of twin-channels and ultimately whilst the noise it delivers is impressive…it’s still no F1 car/333SP.

The big issue is as we’ve discussed, when you pair the straight through rear section with the manifolds and cat replacement pipes you have an exhaust system that no longer allows for efficient enough scavenging at low RPM to develop torque.


The issue with Tubi’s manifolds are that they are not equal length manifolds and as such are not optimised for backpressure, pairing these with backpressure reducing cat replacement pipes AND a straight-through rear section reduces the amount of scavenging that the exhaust is able to produce which results in a loss of low-end torque.
Also their design isn’t the greatest for sound either.


Consider the pictures here:
Ferrari 599 GTB Header
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Ferrari 599 GTO Header
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The two cars have a RADICALLY entirely different sound – and they also have a radically re-designed header. The 6 into 1 pipework on the GTO gives it that scream that the we’ve come to love. Well the Tubi F50 header is NOTHING like this. It’s an upgraded manifold, yes, which is double walled to reduce heat but it’s not even close to header which will deliver the optimal backpressure and sound for the car – it’s almost a “tidier” version of the OEM manifold but we want something better still - there’s clear scope for a better design here…

This principle applies to all of you how have wondered how the difference in sound came to be between Enzo VS FXX or taken to extremes, late 1990’s Mercedes S600 and Pagani Zonda (which share the same V12!)). There are videos on YT of 550/575m wearing custom made 6 into 1 style manifolds and they have an UNBELIEVABLE different sound – a high pitched motorsport scream.


Here's an example of what manifolds can extract from an S600



So it’s clear, the critical manifold shape and tuning can make a monumental difference to the tonal quality of an exhaust note and it’s clear that we have that scope to improve with the Tubi, let alone the original Ferrari OEM manifold.


It’s worth point out at this stage that YES, we’ve seen heard the famous Japanese brand exhaust videos for the Ferrari F50;


Here’s the J-Wolf


Here’s the Kreissieg.

Note – the owner also has a Carrera GT on which we’ve tried every conceivable Tubi/Inconel/Steel/Muffler/Straight Pipe before settling on a Kriessieg)

And here is the MS Racing:


We learnt the following from those videos:
a) The J-wolf, we can’t find any details of it’s configuration AT ALL..
b) The MS Racing appears to be a muffler delete at the rear, so nothing we’ve not seen/heard before but in that video appears to have a special equal length manifold.

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c) The Kreissieg appears to use an X-pipe crossover for the rear section (it's unclear whether the X actually blends exhaust gasses from the V12 together – it looks as thought it may just be structural) – picture below and in the last install they did, they used the “good-but-not-perfect” Tubi Manifold upstream of this.
That said, it’s switchable – you can see that there’s a muffler there to quieten down the car also….

Kreissieg rear section
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When we discussed an exhaust with these companies by the way, they were not able to deliver an off-the-shelf product. They needed the F50 there in Japan with them, (which was out of the question, given that the car is in the UK. The moulds for their products were either destroyed or unavailable and they were not able to either build new systems or were very nervous about fitment being accurate.


In any case, we had already decided to work with the best in the business…….

The next step is starting to document the manufacturing process with Capristo - we look forward to hearing everyone's thoughts!

 

Thank you so much for your feedback!

It's interesting that you say your friend's F50 with the Tubi was slower than a car with the OEM exhaust - we have Dyno figures confirming a 30bhp gain from installing the full Tubi - my only conclusion is that he had the Rear Silencer Replacements and so was suffering from the lack of scavenging because of the inadequate back pressure within the Tubi. This scavenging issue was confirmed on the dyno with a significant flat spot present in the low-mid range powerband.

Of course these things are totally subjective, but I'm sure you'd agree that compromise is not the best way to achieve perfection. Ferrari were incredibly limited by the emissions and noise regulations of the day, and as such it's a tautology to say that the OEM exhaust could have been better!

The Sistine Chapel would not have turned out better if Michelangelo was forced to wear a blindfold while he was painting it!

As for the Kreissieg exhaust, this is also fairly surprising as one of the benefits of the exhaust is that it is twin channel (as such it can be switched between loud/quiet).

I'm not sure if the F50 exhaust is the same, but on the Carrera GT exhaust we just installed the valves have two bolts that control the amount of travel permitted by the valve - as such you can control how loud the loud channel is and how quiet the quiet channel is! It may be worth seeing if that same mechanism is on the F50 exhaust!

In any case, thank you again for your contribution - this is the wonderful thing about modification, everyone has their own taste and really as long as it puts a smile on your face then you've done the right thing. We're just hoping to fill a gap in the market that we feel desperately needs plugging!

 

Joe,

Firstly, I read your 288 book a while back and it was amazing - huge congratulations to you on a real masterpiece.

As for this video - this is EXACTLY what we're talking about and this video was actually one of the reference pieces we sent to Capristo when we first started discussing the project. It makes my hair stand on end every time I hear it, genuinely incredible.

I think we need to be clear that the exhaust we're building is designed to be as performance motivated as it is aurally motivated - we're looking to improve on the OEM in every respect by allowing the engine to breathe freely (but correctly!) and creating a sound that this video demonstrates is achievable with that engine!