I've had my 07 Ultra about 7 months and I finally did a few upgrades. I added a stage1 and ordered my exhaust from a guy on E-Bay who modified the stock mufflers they sound great. this was a great alternitive for a budget. The dealer said with the stage1 and mufflers I would need a race tuner. THis guy said I would not because most of the baffles were still in. Any opinions, I have no popping and it seems to run great.

 

My bet, if I were a betting man, is that it will run hot, possibly ping, and very lean. If I were you, which I am not, I would definitely go with a fuel management system. IMHO !!!

 

I agree. You're probably running very lean and are now running the risk of burning a valve or piston. It should be running hotter than it was when you bought it, and probably coughing on acceleration (at times) and popping on decelerating. I would add a fuel management system of some kind - the sooner, the better. Just MHO...

 

It would seem to me that if one were running so lean as to damage the engine that it would be obvious by how the engine was performing. If all seems well isn't all likely well? Am I wrong?

 

Any suggestions on a system

 

Get ready to be way confused when You ask,what's the best system!

If You buy a race tuner (SERT) it's yours for life.I marries itself to the bike and that's it.That's fine,if You plan on keeping the bike and doing more mods later on but if You decide later that You don't care for the SERT, you're out that money.The Power Commander III is another option and does not marry itself to the bike so if You want to go to something different later You can sale it and regain some of Your money down the road.It all depends on what all You plan on doing to the bike in the future.If You don't plan on making future changes,either will do You fine.I wont even go into the auto tune devices to keep from driving You batty for now.

 

The "system" could be running so lean as to be doing slight damage; continually. Not something that could be maintained indefinitely if so.

I guess I don't know what the "official" definition is of "stage one". I'd assume it meant, primarily, Harley better-flowing intake, Harley better-flowing exhaust, and (Harley, if it's electronic) fuel management adjustment to make the other two things appropriate. Even if any or none of the three were HD stuff it would still be necessary, I feel, to include them all when declaring "stage one".

With just muffler changes you can probably get by without re-programming the ECU or piggy-backing it with something else. In any case I'd say not so when the intake situation changes. When in closed-loop mode there's probably enough range in the system to compensate for the former. I'd be scared as hell to test its mettle with the latter.