Is a 2.5 inch catback (not Mandrel bent) good for our cars?

[BigED]

I just got back from meineke. I want a dynomax super turbo muffler installed on my car. I was thinking on having them make a 2.5 inch mandrel bent catback. He said if I bring the muffler and the tips, he'd do the pipes all the way back and charge me $120 total for the pipes and labor. He said that they don't have any mandrel bent parts. So I said, maybe do the whole piping at 2.75 inches. He asked why I wanted to go bigger and why I wanted mandrel bent because if I went bigger on the exhaust I'd lose torque.

I want to get a Jet Stage 2 (which requires freer flowly exhaust) Is 2.5 inch back without mandrel bent good for my car or am I restricting it too much?

I don't want to suffocate it, but I don't want any torque loss. Can I still use the chip and gain all of its results or is this a bad idea? Do you think I should take this guy up on his deal?

[WickEdSix9838]

I have a non-mandrel bent 2.5" on my car, most of the time you cant feel much gains w/just an exhaust but it made my car feel TOTALLY different, it picked up a whole lot, but if you do that i woudl recommend a cut-out too, i felt more gains when i got that...

[BigED]

What exactly is a cut-out and how much is it?

[93v6firebird]

a lot of people with the 3.8L go a lot bigger than 2.5" like 2.75 and 3s mostly, thats what I would think would be the best thing. The 3.8s have a good amount of low end torque, and youre not losing any youre just moving the max torque up some in RPMS and moving the entire power band up some... and probably gaining some.
you want to get the freest flowing you can, meineke may be telling you that b/c they cant make mandrel bent pipes.. at least the ones around here cant. So... go to another place