Nabil3IS

Hey, I wanted to write this up really quickly so that anyone who has the same issues in the future can learn from my experience. I purchased a Joe-Z axle-back used (It was a good deal and at the time they were out of stock everywhere with no ETA on restock) and it came with no hardware, just the exhaust. Not knowing that the flanges were different I went out and bought brand new OEM hardware (bolts and springs) but to my surprise, they didn't fit the Joe-Z exhaust flange. I also did not notice that the flanges were different. The OEM mid-pipe has a rounded flange that uses a donut gasket and the Joe-Z exhaust has a flat flange. After struggling with all of this I went to two shops and both told me that they couldn't do it, that it would leak, and that the only options were 1. cut the flange off of the OEM axle-back and put weld it in place of the flat flange on the Joe-Z exhaust or 2. just weld it straight to the mid-pipe. Both seemed unnecessary, expensive, and silly so I went ahead and decided to do it myself (I usually do the work myself but it seemed like a headache after finding out the bolts and flangers were different so I wanted to just get it done) I did ask on the forums for some help and I got a had one person help me with planning it out. So this is the actual solution:

First- Getting the old bolts off which was AWFUL and took me like 3 hours total. My tips for this are to make sure you have PB Blaster or Liquid Wrench and soak (i mean put a ton of the liquid on) the bolts and let it sit for a while, then go back and put more and start attempting to take it off. I had to use a mix of deep sockets, extensions, and normal sockets to be able to fit my ratchet in there and get them off
Second- Getting off the rubber exhaust hangers was easy as long as you put WD-40 on the hole and purchase a set of exhaust hanger pliers like . After that, they should come off super easy and you'll be thankful you purchased them.
Third- When installing the new exhaust I laid under the car with the new exhaust on top of me and someone holding the end (exhaust tip) in the rough position of where it would sit normally. Then I put the other end (the one with the flange that attaches to the mid-pipe) on the exhaust hanger so that it would hold in place. Then I came out from under the car and put all the exhaust hangers-on. (use WD-40 again). After I had it held up I then had to pull the mid-pipe down and the axle back up so that the flanges met and I put the bolts in. (important- I used a M10-1.5 x 60mm that were fully threaded with a flat washer on one end and a hex nut with a lock washer on the other. You can use probably use a slightly bigger bolt or smaller bolt but this is what worked for me) I then hand tightened the nut and repeated the same steps on the other side. After both of the exhausts were installed I went ahead and tightened them as tight as possible without breaking any bolts. After that, I went ahead and started the car and checked for exhaust leaks (this can be done by spraying soapy water where the flanges meet and looking for any bubbling) and there were none.

That's pretty much it, it probably seems pretty obvious but I struggled a lot on this because the old bolts were super rusty and the fact that I had to find hardware myself since I didn't get any with the exhaust. Also, the shops telling me it wasn't possible didn't help either. If anyone has questions just ask and I'll try and help though I am not super active.