Originally Posted by Td33

Just out of curiosity, I went out and looked at my wife's Subaru Legacy exhaust. Bought the car new about 14 months ago. Car has about 11k on it and has been her daily driver. This car has been driven in rain, ice, snow, on heavily salted roads and does not look anything like OP 's exhaust.

To be fair, I don't know how many miles the OP put on this exhaust and what the exact environmental conditions were.

Good luck to the OP in resolving this.

Originally Posted by Joe@Fabspeed

JOHN

This is Joe Fabiani the President of Fabspeed Motorsport USA. I am a Porsche Club member for 30+ years and also a passionate Porsche owner, collector, DE and Club racer.

What you are seeing on your Fabspeed Motorsport 991 X is simply surface rust that is 100% normal from regular driving and enjoying your car. Seriously, surface rust comes from routinely driving your car or any car in the rain and picking up road debris that clings to mufflers and exhaust pipes and consequently rusts. Surface rust is therefore vehicle driven particulate matter that has metal shavings and that material in the presence of rain continual heat cycling surface rust forms and migrates on the surface on any exhaust system. Its a linear progression that is driven primarily by driving in the rain.

IF you look closely in your photos your factory 991 Porsche headers are a deep brown from surface rust as are some of the other pictures from various replies. Your factory Porsche clamps and hardware are also heavily rusted as well. This is normal and customary. At Fabspeed we see daily driven cars that endure years of winter usuage from New England to New Jersey and these guys have snow tires on their Porsche, BMW and Bentley cars and the cars factory exhausts and occasionally Fabspeed exhausts are caked in dirt and surface rust.

Porsche OEM exhaust systems are typically T409 stainless steel which is a cheaper grade of stainless steel with more iron in the alloy. Porsche also has 304 stainless steel which is non magnetic.

The Fabspeed Motorsport 991 X pipe you have is Type 304 L (L for low carbon content) and is a premium USA sourced material from Rath Gibson. The Fabspeed Motorsport center section is the Worlds only lost wax CAD designed and engineered Maxflo X pipe that is also T304L and our brackets are T304L and cut on our Fabspeed FLOW Mach 4 waterjet and cnc bent on the Fabspeed Bystronic German press brake. All these parts would last for millions and millions of years on the bottom of the Ocean as these parts are T304L and will not rust.

Once again surface rust will OCCUR no matter what the base material alloy of the exhaust system is made as surface rust is material that is clinging and rusty on the surface of the host substrate. So even an AKRAPOVIC Titanium exhaust or an Inconel T625 stainless steel exhaust system will have serious surface RUST if the car is actually driven and enjoyed on a regular basis in the rain. The base material will exhibit surface rust even though the substrate is 100% inert from oxidation.

Therefore surface rust happens on any and all exhaust systems no matter what the name brand and cost. Pictures don't explain surface rust vis a vis brands and garage queen over a daily driver and if used on a costline or salty New England to Montreal Canada.

Fabspeed Motorsport designed and engineered the worlds 1st investment cast X pipe for Porsche, Ferrari, Lamborghini and other exotic cars. Most companies cobble together X pipes from 4 quantity 90 degree bends and or as that FVD pipe picture shows an " H pipe with a metal welded patch panels" to cover the center so called X. Caveat emptor. The Fabspeed investment lost wax X pipes make maxmimum power and sports car sound and will never ever break. The investment made by Fabspeed for tooling was extremely expensive versus cobbling an X pipe. Please notice the difference.

Posrche, Ferrari, McLaren, Bentley and Lamborghini use accuseal style clamps for their OEM exhaust system and Fabspeed Motorsport buys these quality clamps from the same resources. Fabspeed did NOT cut any corners and the rust on the bolts is normal. No one uses stainless on stainless Bolts & LOck nuts as installing stainless on stainless results in GAULing with surface rust.

Fabspeed Motorsport USA supplies Wurth Germany hardware at great expense for all our exhaust systems and Wurth is better than OEM hardware.

JOHN your Fabspeed X pipe is working geart and is not leaking and you have nothing to be concerned about. If you want extra clamps let us know as we are fellow Porsche owners through and through and car enthusiasts and stand behind everything we do.

Originally Posted by John McLane

That is an awesome explanation, which I knew in part and took me to choose Fabspeed in the first place. Not only that, the sales process though a bit lengthy was very reassuring. I used to wear the shirt you guys sent me in car events, due to my satisfaction with your product.

All I asked was to check on the clamps due to the amount of rust and see the possibility of replacement. The first answer is "we typically don't cover under warranty and we will see the cost for replacement". The second reply "this is due to proximity to the ocean" ( as explained before, not true). After that, all my emails were ignored.
So you have 3 things: first, if it's our fault we don't pay; then it's not our fault it's where you live; and then finally, we can't be bothered. Of course this is only my perspective of the events.

Something this simple eclipses all your efforts in building rapport with your costumers when your salespeople ignored them. At that point all the awesome engineering and whatever reason for color, rust or else become irrelevant as I could never purchase from a vendor that shies from replying to a costumer (Just replying, not necessarily complying).

Out of curiosity from others I attached pictures of the rest of the OEM resonator pipes and tips from inside. As shown, different aspect but as you explained the temperature might play a role as this part of the exhaust is more distal to the engine. I don't know to which degree the difference in temperature is that enormous to yield such a different appearance.

Originally Posted by ChuckJ

John:
I'd take Joe up on his offer for new clamps and bolts.

And it sounds like if any of the other components ever rusts through he would stand behind it.

ChuckJ

Originally Posted by Joe@Fabspeed

HI John

I will have my shipping department pull some clamps and wurth copper nuts and ship the parts ground to you with a new Fabspeed t-shirt. Kindly let your Fabspeed sales person know your size and other matters and or call in today.

Originally Posted by Fabspeed Motorsport

John McLane,

Thanks for getting that information over to me, I just wanted to give you a quick update. I personally went to the shipping department and helped box this up to ensure it went out today. You'll find a total of 6 new clamps, 2 new gaskets and 6 new copper lock nuts along with a new GT4 T-Shirt for you to sport like you used to.

Even though this is not something we'd typically cover under our warranty since it's not structural and doesn't affect the function, I still wanted to hook you up with something for your trouble and to hopefully illustrate that we do truly care about our customers' experience. It's paramount for us. I look forward to you getting these components and installing them so you can be shiny and fresh again!

One thing that I'd personally recommend: When you take everything off to swap the clamps, give the x-pipe itself a good wipe down with some metal polish. All of the surface corrosion you're seeing should come right off, leaving you with a gleaming new pipe!

Thank you again, I hope to work with you soon!