I'm not generally one that wants a machine to be louder than it needs to be. That said, over the past few weeks, as shown in a few threads on the topic, I have been leaning toward a muffler delete set-up on my soon-to-arrive Classica, but I really needed to know what to expect.
I have the day off from work today, so I rang my salesman and asked if I could have 2 minutes and come listen to a Classica/Lusso, to hear how tame is tame, since it's been 2 months since my Classica/Abarth test drives. "Sure, come on over!"
I arrived to find a Classica automatic parked near the front door of the showroom. The salesman grabbed the ke... the fob (that will take getting used to) and we went to fire it up. Oops, the battery was flat (unknown why, I didn't worry about it). He grabbed a jump charger and while we waited a minute or 2 to let it do its job, he smiled and thanked me for coming to do this so he could find the dead battery before someone else happened along to test drive it. The car fired right up, and being midday and pretty quiet, he asked if I'd like to go... charge up the car for him. Sure! Now I could take the exhaust into account under driving conditions. I lapped it up and down the local freeway a couple times while listening to the stock Classica exhaust, and I've concluded that even though it is very tame and quiet at a standstill and at steady driving speeds, its muted bark is more than enough for me when jamming the gas pedal from stops, hammering straight on-ramps, and pushing hard through a full freeway cloverleaf system. A delete system would be fun for short hops of hooliganism>, but when I consider that a lot of my driving will be multi-hour stints out on the back roads and rural highways, I've concluded that I would rather not have the extra sound volume of the delete system, that the quiet stock system is in fact enough for me.
Thanks to those that have contributed to my thoughts and inquiries on the topic, both pro and con. Now I'll be able to direct the money saved toward other car goodies, and gasoline.
Steve.
I have the day off from work today, so I rang my salesman and asked if I could have 2 minutes and come listen to a Classica/Lusso, to hear how tame is tame, since it's been 2 months since my Classica/Abarth test drives. "Sure, come on over!"
I arrived to find a Classica automatic parked near the front door of the showroom. The salesman grabbed the ke... the fob (that will take getting used to) and we went to fire it up. Oops, the battery was flat (unknown why, I didn't worry about it). He grabbed a jump charger and while we waited a minute or 2 to let it do its job, he smiled and thanked me for coming to do this so he could find the dead battery before someone else happened along to test drive it. The car fired right up, and being midday and pretty quiet, he asked if I'd like to go... charge up the car for him. Sure! Now I could take the exhaust into account under driving conditions. I lapped it up and down the local freeway a couple times while listening to the stock Classica exhaust, and I've concluded that even though it is very tame and quiet at a standstill and at steady driving speeds, its muted bark is more than enough for me when jamming the gas pedal from stops, hammering straight on-ramps, and pushing hard through a full freeway cloverleaf system. A delete system would be fun for short hops of hooliganism>, but when I consider that a lot of my driving will be multi-hour stints out on the back roads and rural highways, I've concluded that I would rather not have the extra sound volume of the delete system, that the quiet stock system is in fact enough for me.
Thanks to those that have contributed to my thoughts and inquiries on the topic, both pro and con. Now I'll be able to direct the money saved toward other car goodies, and gasoline.
Steve.