I currently have the Varex active mufflers fitted to the XFR and I do enjoy the noise that it makes when the valves are fully open. But it sounds nowhere near as guttural and brutal as an F Type V8S or R. I know that the F Type V8 models sound the way they do because of the factory muffler design.

Does anyone have any ideas on what I can do to get mine to sound like the F Type? I don't care about the pops and backfires, I just want that deep and unique roar.

 

You are never going to get an XF to sound like an F-Type V8 as the exhaust set up is too different.
But you can get close by having a complete "pipes only" exhaust - no cats, no central mufflers, no rear mufflers.
Of course it will be horrendously loud with mahoosive amounts of drone and more pops and crackles on the overrun than you can imagine, and the performance will drop away with zero back pressure, but it will sound a lot more like an F-Type V8!
But seriously, to get close you have to remove or reduce much of the restriction in the exhaust and getting a balance is very difficult.
I put an H-pipe in my old XFR in place of the central muffler, leaving the central resonator in place, and I replaced the rear mufflers with hi-flow straight through ones.
The car sounded great at idle and brilliant at WOT, a lot like an F-Type R, but the drone on cruise or light throttle was 'orrible.
From the driver's seat I didn't really comprehend how bad the drone was then one day I sat in the back while SWMBO drove, and she makes Miss Daisy look like a hoon.
It sounded terrible back there, unbearably bad, I put the stock mufflers back on the next day!

 

Thanks for the input Oz, I knew that was the reality, but had an unreasonable expectation and thought I could get some feasible ideas. I have the original downpipes with factory cats, but the mid pipe is an X-Pipe with the center muffler and resonators removed, mated to the two varex active mufflers. If I leave the valves fully open, I get unbearable drone as is on light throttle and highway speeds. I guess the only other way I can get more noise and be able to control that noise is by changing to custom headers and 200 cell cats.

 

Couple of ways to do it. It all comes down to volume/sizing of the overall pipes, mufflers and resonators (Cats not so much) I good custom exhaust shop can do all the calculations for you and recommend a muffler and resonator pair. They can also tune the system and perhaps design and build you a Helmholtz resonator to eliminate drone.

Its not gonna be cheap because they will need to analyze sound waveform in the cabin to get the proper measurements to build the Helmholtz chamber.

My guess is if you supply an F-type stock exhaust they will be able to measure everything up, pick the correct diameter pipes, proper lengths and resonator and muffler design and sizes to approximate/equal the F-type.

 

One of the problems with this is the F-Type R rear exhaust is a single large East/West muffler while the XF has a pair of North/South mufflers.
So no way one can be based or designed on the other.
The only possible solution along these lines is to get hold of a pair of F-Type SVR rear mufflers as they are North/South.
But they cost an absolute fortune (try $6,000 each!) and your chances of getting your hands on a pair for R&D are approaching zero.

 

You only need muffler volume ( not to match the installation) You can grab a single muffler system and calculate the N/S equivalent - (and see how its designed. Most likely is just a dual in dual out straight through design packed with sound deadening material). You need pipe diameter (in/out), capacity and and there ya go. Doable is all I am saying, But how much ??? not cheap....

Here is my custom set up for a 4Cyl Turbo Saab, converted to dual exhaust. Similar exhaust systems were only available in Europe.Shipping and cost was prohibitive. I made a clone of a hirsch here in the states (hirsh was Saab's AMG equivalent)

I had someone send me the tips (since this was cheap and they are resonated. The system dropped a resonator but had no highway whine. We used measurements (and I had someone in EU send along a sound clip[ - I will see if I can find it but it was 2006 LOL)

Pretty much a straight on match, at least to my ears.

Cost at the time $1600 Maybe a little less but we did a bit of experimenting util we figured out that we needed to drop the resonator.

 

I think mine sounds pretty similar to an F-Type. I have catless down pipes, custom x pipe, and Spires stage 2 exhaust.

 

I am not sure on how to get it to sound like the F-Type as that car does sound brilliant, however Ryan at Ardent Performance makes a fantastic exhaust for our vehicles.

This is with the full exhaust from Ardent Performance, headers all the way to mufflers.

 

Somebody did a really poor job respraying that red car's bumper.

 

And that's on topic?

 

This sounds insane, in a good way

I can't go catless as they get checked during the yearly emissions. Don't want to deal with the hassle of removing and reinstalling everytime.

Since I have an X-Pipe midpipe already, I might pick up just the Ardent active mufflers, they seem to sound much better than the generic Varex active ones I have on the car at the moment.

 

Oh it sounds so amazing. With the valves closed and windows up you hear the exhaust some while accelerating, but cruising it is silent.

With the valves open it is an animal that is sure to draw anyone's attention who is near. And the pops it offers, oh my there are pops and crackles.

I personally absolutely love the sound of it closed, for just driving around offers a very unique and wonderful sound that isn't to loud.

I would highly recommend checking out the headers as they are a true work of art, and offer some pretty massive gains as well!

When you are talking with Ardent Performance ask to speak to Ryan, and tell him you've been speaking with Thomas Erickson!

All in all I could not be happier with the way it sounds, I have only a clip of me driving that someone else took and I will send it to you via pm as it's not that great quality.