How to Replace Flex Pipe 2006-12 Nissan Altima

What's up, guys? I'm Andy from 1A Auto. In this video, I'm going to show you how to replace the flex pipe on this 2010 Nissan Altima. If you need parts for your vehicle, click the link in the description and head over to 1AAuto.com.

I'm going to take this bracket out first. Normally, you'd probably be able to just get a socket on here and take these nuts off. These are badly rusted, so I'm going to have to heat those up. Before I do that, just to gain more access, take this bracket off. Just take a 13-millimeter socket and an air gun. Take those out. You could always use a ratchet.

All right, I have this opened up. I'm just going to heat right here. It doesn't look like there's much left of those nuts, so I'll try to heat them up, take them off, or probably just cut them off with the torches. There we go. It's starting to spin a little bit. Try to get this off. I got that off. Now I'm not going to reuse this nut, obviously, but if I can prevent from having to drill out the stud, it's going to save me some time. Pull that off.

Now I'm going to do the same thing for this nut on this side. I got this one loose also. Now you could have tried to do this without heating it up, but they would have just broke. At least I was able to save the studs. All right. Afterwards, you could take some stud cleaners or some rethreaders and rethread those. That looks pretty good.

Now the O2 sensor is right here. I'm just going to disconnect this from the electrical connector. I'm going to take some needle nose pliers just to get underneath here. Squeeze this, and then slide this out. Now there's a little button to release the connector. Push down on the button. Just take a screwdriver. I'm going to get underneath the lock because there's a lot of dirt in there. Disconnect the O2 sensor. You can blow it out with some compressed air. All right, that's good.

You can use a O2 socket or an O2 sensor wrench, or you can just use a 7/8 wrench, which is what I'm going to do. I'm just going to use the box end of the wrench and loosen it up, if it comes loose. Sometimes these stick on there pretty good. It's on real tight. Just loosen this up. If you have to, you can put a pipe on the end of the wrench. Get that loose. Take that out, and there it is.

These nuts don't look that great either. I'm actually going to heat these up with the torches and take those out the same way I did with the other ones. Looking pretty good. All right, got that one to loosen up. Two more to go. That one came out pretty easy. All right, so got that last one off. All right, so we got all the nuts out. Now I'm just going to separate this, just take a hammer and bang it. I'm just going to use an air chisel. Sometimes the vibrations will break this loose. It's pretty rusted. I was able to loosen that up.

Now ideally, this flange doesn't look that great either. It'd be a good time to replace this part of the exhaust, but for right now we're just going to replace this front pipe. I'm just going to get a pry bar, pry these pipes apart. I wanted this other pipe to slide down, not up. Let's get it over like this. There we go. Just like that. We can try to pry this. There's a muffler hanger right here. Pry this out a little bit. It's a good idea to not use any lubricant on this, but I'm just going to use a little brake parts cleaner. It's just going to loosen it up a little bit, so it slides a little better. Then it'll dry really quick.

I'm just going to use a hammer on this. Now I'm going to use the pry bar over here. There we go. All right, just wiggle that and wiggle that out. There's the pipe. I'm just going to take a pry tool. You can use a straight blade screwdriver, pry that whole gasket off. You can clean this area up with a die grinder or a wire brush. I did the same to this area. Just make sure there's no gasket material left.

For right here, I'm going to install this gasket just like that. That's good. With the new pipe, I have this extra O2 sensor hole, which this vehicle doesn't have that, so I just want to put a plug in that. I'll just use a socket with the correct size in it, and snug that up. Every one of these plugs is going to be a little bit different. This one happens to be a eight-millimeter hex bit. If you have any stickers on the exhaust, it's a good idea to take them off. Something little like this is not that big of a deal. You could always drive the vehicle heated up, and then try to peel it off after. It'll come off a lot easier. Just be careful not to burn yourself while you're doing. You can just use a pick or a razor blade and just peel it off.

Before we send this up, I just want to put this seal on the end of this. This is just like a doughnut gasket. It's just going to go right there. Just hold that there. We're going to slide this into the exhaust mount right here, the rubber mount. Just twist it back and forth just like that. Just slide it back. Now you already put that gasket on in the back. Just like that. Then if this doughnut fell off, just put that back on. I just want to push this back a little bit, try to get this to line up. I did get that stud back on, so we'll reuse that. Sometimes it's easier to just reuse the stud than to try to find any other bolt that works. I'm just going to use a pry bar and just pry this back a little bit. Get that over the studs back there. It's probably going to fall again. Just give it a little tap. There we go. That's in position.

All right, everything is lined up. Now I can put the nuts on. I have some nuts for the front and some nuts for right here. Get those started. I'm just going to use a 14-millimeter socket. That's the size of the nuts that I replaced and a air gun. If you don't have an air gun, just use a ratchet. I'm going to do the back ones as well. Just take this O2 sensor. Now this happens to be the O2 sensor that is after that catalytic converter, so it doesn't monitor the engine. It monitors the catalytic converter. Slide this in position here.

Now we're just reusing this O2 sensor, but if you're replacing it, the procedure is going to be the same. I'm just going to take my 7/8 wrench, tighten this up. All right. Snug that up. Not too tight. You really don't have to tighten O2 sensors too much. Slide the wrench off. I'm going to connect the connector right here. Just line it up. It only goes on one way. Lock it in place. There's a retainer that holds the connector onto this bracket. Line that up. This wire is going to go through this little retainer right here. You can use a little pick or a screwdriver, try to get this to line up just like that. I'm just going to take this bracket, get this lined up. Get those bolts in. Take a 13-millimeter socket. I'm going to use an air gun, but you can use a ratchet if you don't have one.

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