I have an '04 RK that I bought used. It came with a SE intake and had some aftermarket 3" slash cut slip-ons, but not really sure what they were because they weren't branded. I'm young and apparently have a burning desire to loose my hearing, so I took them off because they weren't loud enough for me. I put on 1 7/8" straight fishtails, but they were so over the top loud and snappy at road speed I had to put some short baffles in them. I also took the stock rear head pipe to a metal shop and had them hack out the crossover and converted it to true duals. Since then I'm getting decel pops and sputters, mostly on the left side. I'm thinking the angle of the bend might be to harsh and is distorting the exhaust pressure.

I've recently become more interested in the tone than the volume, but still want a good balance. After all I bought a Harley, not a Honda. Anyway, it doesn't have O2 sensors and I'm thinking of chaning the mufflers again and need to know if I should buy some sort of fuel pack or tuner to dial it in? I would be appreciative for suggestions on the best bang for my buck on both the fuel pack and pipes. I would like a system that I can tune myself and doesn't require me to run to the dealer the next time I decide to change something. Also, should I go back to a crossover system?

 

Lots of these pipes are set up to run well in their stock configuration, as you move away from that configuration they begin to run like crap. Lots of guys pull the baffles but they are really just looking for LOUD not performance. Some may even get away with a half decent running pipe when they are thru.

Swapping mufflers around typically doesn't require any fuel managment, I'm assuming the previous owner did a stage 1 or some kind of tune when he upgrated the exhaust & AC?

Did your pops and sputters start after you modified your exhaust? I am thinking that this is the source of your problem. You probably dont' need a crossover in your next set, but get ones that aren't cross over by design. Run with them for a while and check you plugs and listen for more decel pop, then deside if you need some kind of fuel management.

 

Thanks Zacharia_11,

I was getting a little worked up about this yesterday worrying that I'm frying my motor by running to lean, but I've checked the plugs last week after 2k miles of running with this configuration and they're that grayish-brown color they're supposed to be. I think you're right that my crossover elimination modification might be causing the irregular sounds, so I'm looking for another true-dual type sweeping rear head pipe on ebay right now. I like the looks of the fishtails, but I'm ready for something different. The drag pipes were cool on my Sporty, but didn't really give me the sound I was anticipating on my RK. I'm thinking of going to a larger diameter pipe to deepen the tone a little. Not too big because I don't want the drone of large diameter pipes, maybe 2 1/2" would be perfect. Thanks again for the advice.

 

I was just thinking about something...would my exhaust choices (good or bad) have made a huge difference in performance? I'm not racing my RK, so most in-town riding I probably wouldn't notice anyway. But I hoped on my buddy's '09 Heritage and it was like driving a Vette compared to my bike. Is the 96" really that much more powerfull? How should it compare to my 88" beside the 8ci and extra gear?