Do Exhaust Tips Change the Sound of Your Car?

 Exhaust tips are often added to a vehicle for aesthetic purposes only, but if you want to make the exhaust note slightly louder or more aggressive, then they can amplify that purpose as well. Since exhaust systems control the overall sound of your car, they can be tuned by using different exhaust tip types and other factors like length or width.

So since exhaust tips change sound slightly, the question then becomes “how?” If you would like to learn more about how exhaust tips work and how they can affect your exhaust’s sound, then read on!

 Note: Exhaust tips are not incredibly essential to adjust what makes your car louder. If you want your ride’s exhaust to sound more aggressive or deeper all around, a sure bet is to replace your muffler. Exhaust components like a performance muffler and resonator play a more important part in crafting the right exhaust note. That said, exhaust tips certainly will enhance the cosmetic look of your car.

Changing the Sound With Exhaust Tips

You know that an exhaust note of your car is the sound it emits when you rev your engine. And as we read earlier, exhaust tips do play a small role in changing that exhaust note. By changing the tip’s shape or adding baffles to change how much air passes through, you can alter the sound that emerges from your tailpipe. Here are a handful of ways you can amplify your exhaust’s sound using exhaust tips:

When adding an exhaust tip with a wider or narrower pipe diameter than the muffler itself, it can effectively manage the sound waves escaping your vehicle. It won’t make your machine sound like a diesel truck, but ensuring there’s a significant size difference between your tailpipe and exhaust tip will produce a noticeable audible effect. Wider aftermarket exhaust tips can enhance the deep sounds made by the engine and your exhaust system, while a small, slim exhaust tip can make the noise more thin and gruff–as a smaller diameter exhaust tip somewhat restricts the exhaust flow to minimize engine noise.

Typically, yes. Exhaust sound gets compressed and has more time to fade out if it's trapped in a long exhaust tip, so loud exhaust and engine sounds have a higher chance of escaping in a short exhaust tip. Most of the noise you hear when adding shorter exhaust tips is reflected off the pavement and bounces off of your vehicle's underbody. So it's more of an echo that’s slightly increasing the sound waves. On the other hand, smaller diameter (not shorter) exhaust tips restrict the noise level, especially if the tip is smaller than the connecting tailpipe.

Exhaust tips come in single walled and double walled forms. For single wall exhaust tips, a single layer of metal covers the entire surface, giving it less mass. Double-wall exhaust tip pipes are designed to wrap the metal back into itself for an outward-facing end that’s smoother and more polished than its single-walled counterpart. As they’re heavier and in most cases larger, they can also have a fuller sound. When it comes down to differences between the two, there really aren’t many. It’s more of a cosmetic styling preference rather than a performance or sound choice. ​​The quality and structure are fairly identical, except for the extra layers for the double wall.  

 Single Wall:

Most exhaust tips point backward, but some tips are positioned at the ground. These turn down exhaust tips can reduce exhaust noise. Turn down exhaust tips help to quiet an unnecessarily noisy exhaust system while reverting gases and other fumes away from your vehicle. Because of gravitational pull towards the ground, they also reduce grime buildup, keeping your exhaust system cleaner than stock or normal tips.

Besides doing all that, they look pretty dang cool too.

Intercooled exhaust tips are ventilated, cooling the gases as they leave the system. Their intercooled vents that are designed to cool exhaust gas temperatures are constructed with high-quality stainless steel for ultimate durability. They can minimize the noise from your car's exhaust system, producing a softer exhaust note.

What Changes the Sound of an Exhaust?

As we mentioned, performance mufflers, exhaust systems like wider pipes, and aftermarket exhaust tips all play a part in changing the sound of the exhaust. But there are a few other factors worth mentioning.

Make sure your exhaust tips aren't up against the body, but are still supported well. Vibration can occur if not, causing a drone/shaking sound. You also want to leave enough room so the sound doesn’t resonate off the bumper. When you have too close of a distance between the tips and your bumper, then it is possible that resonance can happen. The sound waves will bounce off the surface in an echo effect.

Though we mentioned exhaust systems (and resonators are definitely included in that), we wanted to give more attention to them. The resonator is known as the ”noise organizer” component in the exhaust system. It changes sound waves from vibrations and can be placed before or after mufflers for better flow effectiveness.

If a pipe in your exhaust system has an uncovered opening or a leak, exhaust gases and fumes have a premature escape route and won’t flow through the entire system. As a result, your exhaust will produce much louder noises.

In summary, upgrading your vehicle’s exhaust tips is an effective and inexpensive way to get that true curb appeal and in some cases, amplify or reduce sound. Keep in mind that when blended with an aftermarket exhaust system or a performance muffler, you’ll maximize the potential of your noise level dreams.