'95 Legacy had a broken exhaust flange by the cat converter. I'm hoping this is replaceable and not welded in. So before I start wrenching,  thought I could ask first.

Any thoughts? This is my DD and can't have out of service.

 

to your question... not sure but it does look like a broken weld.

Seems structural but as a temporary fix to quiet things down try high heat furnace caulk. It's about $9 a tube at Home Depot. LINK or one for $12 I used at  Lowes LINK

Clean it as best as you can and apply caulk, perhaps embedding fiberglass cloth into the repair?

Edited January 9, 20206 yr by brus brother

Same thing happened several years ago on our 95 RHD 472k miles. I can see part of the flange rusted and blew away.

It can be fixed with a two piece flange like in the picture. I don't remember the pipe size. I had to get a spring and bolt kit and a new doughnut gasket. I think I had to get two different kits, one for the right size bolt and one for the right size spring.

Most local auto parts stores that carry exhaust should have these.

Yep, flange is welded on. An exhaust shop could probably fix it quick and cheap.

Good to know. Thank you.

2 hours ago, StephenA said:

Good to know. Thank you.

a shop here welds that for $45 for the typical subaru breaks there.  but most local shops (and i totally understand why) quote hundreds or 4 digits to replace the entire exhaust .  you have to call or ask around for the guys willing to just toss it up on the lift for 30 minutes of welding and call it a day.   it might be harder if you're in the PNW, around here every normal daily driver has this happen so it's common. 

My 95 Legacy was like this. I just cut out the flange and a local shop gave me a 6" scrap of new exhaust pipe that the Legacy pipe can slide into. Then I just welded everything together.

I use the bolt on flanges then when there's not enough of that left I attach springs to pull it forwards like an old-school 2-stroke motorcycle exhaust.

I had the bell shaped end flange break off once and I hammered a short piece of pipe into a bell shape and slid that on.

Never give up never surrender!

Looks like I have an action plan. Very cool

I've got something similar that just snapped on my '83 BRAT. fell clean off! I'm looking around for pictures of what this hooked up correctly is even supposed to look like.

They have the wrong bolts in the flange.  There is a stepped bolt that allows some spring movement and flex.

The step flange of the bolt bottom on the front flange.