Poor exhaust mounts on Cs / Mk2s?

[boost monkey 0]

I was thinking the other day about how the exhaust system mount points are quite poor on the Corrado and other Mk2-esque VWs.

 

From the engine:

 

the manifold mounts on the head with xx bolts,

the manifold mounts to the downpipe (which may have a silencer on) with 3? bolts in a triangular pattern.

the downpipe mounts to centre pipe join with a U-shape bracket,

the centre pipe mounts to the first silencer with a U-bracket - the silencer also mounts to the floorpan using hook / bar bracket.

the first silencer goes up and over the rear beam and mounts to the backbox with a U-bracket - this box is also mounted to the floorpan.

 

 

The mount point between the downpipe and centre pipe has been an issue on at least 3 cars I know of: My C, Prodigal's C and my old Mk2 16v. The problem seems to be that there is no support for the downpipe apart from hanging off the manifold; this seems to place a lot of stress on the downpipe-centrepipe join, and this has started blowing at one point or another on all 3 cars mentioned above. My golf had soft engine mounts so that meant the engine moved more than it should have, but I still reckon there is scope for getting some kind of extra bracket (perhaps just as the DP goes under the bulkhead?) to take more of the strain, which would stop the join from working loose. This extra bracket would obviously have to allow for some movement.

 

I'l try to get some pics up sometime.

 

Any thoughts?

[boost monkey 0]

Please lock. I'll copy and paste this into the definitive exhaust thread.