Hush-O-Matic exhaust for ND

I'm not a tuner, not a racer, not a car tinker guy. Hell, half the time I'm lucky I know where the gas tank is. I scored a 2018 ND Club, Brembo/Recaro Edition with 15K on the odometer. I swear, it still had the new car smell. Not kidding. BUT, of course a guy just HAS to mess with his new car, right? Thanks to FM for putting up with my weekly orders! So, LED's all the way around, to include sequential rear turn signals, sequential blacked out side markers, I'll be mounting blacked out corner markers and super bright front turn LED's this week, compact antennae, white LED interior and trunk lights. And, you can see the little red devils on the rear quarter panels! (not from FM) I also replaced the rear spoiler, with the larger one from Moss Miata.

What was missing, is that cool, beloved, classic Roadster rumble sound, made famous ever since the first MG and Triumph hit the streets of London. American factory pipes are just too quiet (thanks for nuthin, EPA), and I didn't want loud road racing/Auto-cross pipes CCRAAKKKKKIIng out their irritating noise that just, you know, irritates.

So, that's when I found the Flyin' Miata "Hush-O-Matic" muffler. It has two chambers...well, really just one chamber with two routes for the exhaust to run through. One route goes through the standard muffler baffles to quiet the noise and exit normally. The other, has a butterfly valve built it, that operates on engine vacuum pressure (it can also be wired up to be on or off, by a switch on your wiper switch). At idle, it's just barely louder than factory (Mom and Dad would approve), but when you stomp on the gas, the extra vacuum boost will pull that valve open, letting about 90% of the exhaust and sound to bypass the baffles inside, to leave the muffler, you know, unmuffled. It's so sneaky! This not a cheater valve opening in front of the muffler, essentially opening the headers. It's all internal within the pipe.

Better yet, the sound is a deep, harmonic growl, rather than the cute little...ahem... "zoom zoom" of the factory can, because the sound resonates inside the muffler before escaping. Driving in town, if you don't speed light to light, is a nice, rumbly (is that a word?) roll with all the beautiful women chasing me, begging for a ride. Getting on the highway, is a lesson on not taking the nice rumbly for granted. With a nice guttural purr that keeps increasing in volume as you run the shifter through it's paces, you almost forget to drive, as you look in the rear view mirror for the bad ass Roadster making all that nice noise! At speed, the sound is noticeable, but not in any way obnoxious. Heck, it's rather soothing! Make sure you gulp a 5 Hour Energy before driving, or the soothing will put you to sleep 🙂

Yeah, if you're on the shelf about adding a new muffler, but don't want the Raspy Rocket Racer noise from the tail pipe? Trust me (you really can), and grab a Flyin' Miata Hush-0-Matic for your MX5. You will enjoy and appreciate the 230 extra horsepower.

*** i'm kidding about the extra horsepower and women begging...or am i????***

Recently received the Hush-O-Matic. Was debating waiting until I could also get the can controller and mid pipe in as I liked the concept of one time install. I installed on a 2020 RF the night before a autocross and could not have been happier, even with the standard vacuum control. I was concerned the lack of user control compared to the can approach would be something I might regret. That was not a issue at all and sounds great at all throttle levels. I still dip into the throttle in the same way, now there is a more satisfying curve to the exhaust note. Even the Mrs was impressed with the sound and finds it a much more appropriate sound for the car.
I expect I will still add the can unit and mid pipe but is quite addicting as it sits.

Outstanding

First, I want to mention, that those are a second week impressions and if something will change or go wrong in future - I will update this review or submit a new one. Another fact - in my opinion, the stock exhaust is one of the worst things in this awesome car (the next one is roof open/close speed limitation, which I am currently solving).

I bought this exhaust with midpipe and CAN integration (and other stuff such as hangers, heat shield, donut gasket, etc.) and sound became much more juicy!

When valves are closed - the sound is just a little bit louder than with the stock exhaust, so no worries for your neighbours at night.
With valves open it is actually quite loud with a nice vibrato, so you can turn some heads for sure.

So, this exhaust appeared to be exactly what I wanted - and it was installed in local car service in just a day.

Thanks for an awesome product, greetings from Latvia! :)

Flyin' Miata were incredibly helpful in getting an exhaust to me when my original packaged mistakenly did an extra lap of the western US due to a comedy of errors on FedEx's part. Whilst the extra two weeks were annoying, I am very happy with the part!

Installed over the period of a few days with some friends, along with the CAN controller (which I will review separately). The exhaust itself was pretty easy to install on my 2020 RF - although it was helpful to have an extra set of hands when mounting it, and also to run the vacuum line.

Make sure you have extra zip ties. We needed considerably more than the four or five that were provided.

We used a little bit of WD40 on the inside of the rubber tubing when attaching it to the vacuum port- this made it much easier to install. (Although even with WD40, getting the right angle connector on was hard work.)

One thing that confused me was removing the nut from the stud. My stud came out in one piece, with the nut still attached. The instructions suggesting using a vise to get the nut off - so I dutifully went out and bought and installed a vise. This didn't help - we could not get the nut off! Reinstalled the stud with nut attached to the recommended torque value in the new exhaust and it seems to be working fine. Not sure if we missed a trick or not!

Overall, the sound is great. Even on quiet mode, it sounds sweeter than the stock exhaust. On fully open mode, which is not recommended but impossible to resist (at least while the novelty hasn't worn off!), it is throaty and burbly. The sound isolation in the RF is decent, so opening the window or taking the roof down helped me appreciate the sound more :).

Note that I test drove another Miata owner's RF with a GWR SS exhaust and it wasn't to my liking. It was higher pitched than I wanted. The Hush-o-matic has a deeper sound and represents in real life in a way that is better than the videos! Highly recommended.

I installed it myself with 1 jack. It was somewhat a pain to run the vacuum line but I figured it out. Took me about 3 hours to do everything including forgetting to replace the gasket to match up with the stock mid pipe and redoing that. Vacuum line is the hardest part. Just be careful and take your time.

Sounds amazing. I love the sportier note. I am very impressed and turning heads is enjoyable.

Only concern is the break in smell. There is a little bit of a plastic burning smell for the first few drives. I presume this will go away as it heats up and burns away any oils or other junk. Good job Flyin Miata!