My 2011 road glide 103 has a TBR 2-1 shorty exhaust and screamin Eagle open air filter. It has a power commander V, with one of their tunes available from their website for a similar setup. Bike has ran great and has been setup like this for 5000+ miles.

last night I noticed as it idled while I was talking to friends that the head pipes were darkly glowing red (it was dark outside).

I shut the bike down, and let it cool for 5 minutes. Restarted it, and it did the same within 2 minutes (both head pipes glowing red). Unplugged the PCV, reconnected in factory setup without PCV, no change.


We trailered the bike back. I was worried about it running way lean and blowing a piston. Reading online, about 50% say it’s way dangerous and they shouldn’t be glowing and 50% say it’s fine.

I really don’t think it’s “fine”. I’m not sure how or why, though, it would be so lean considering the power commander. I don’t wanna dump a ton of money into having it tuned. But I’m pretty stumped at this point.

 

Doesn't sound like anything has changed in the last 5K miles so I see no reason for alarm. At idle, an air cooled VTwin is going to get hot; jump on and ride and it will cool right down. Just may be that this is the first time you have had the bike in this situation; pipes have always glowed red under dark light.

Get the bike dyno tuned; the bike will run better and cooler. A canned tune is hit/miss; just not optimum and one size does not fit all. Getting hot enough to glow the pipes could lead to a stuck valve or a variety of other bad juju issues over time. Better to spend the $$ on a tune than a new top end.

 

Just a suggestion, put the stock air system back on it and see what shakes out. Pull your plugs and take a look. They can tell a bunch.

 

Timing too retarded. It's not igniting the charge til it's on it's way out the exhaust ports and or carbon buildup in the pipes getting hot.
Same thing that happens in the combustion chamber with the excessive carbon buildup from the stock breather setup being routed back internally.

 

While the first line makes sense, the second don't. Some of the first can be due to improper mixture which slows the burning process. Care to explain the second line?

BTW, there will alway be some residual flame being pushed out the exhaust port.

 

Just a comparison to what excessive carbon buildup can do when it gets hot.
And put that popcorn away. It's 9am.

 

So you are saying excessive carbon buildup can cause red exhaust pipes?

 

It is absolutely normal to see glowing on a H-D head pipe if you are letting it run at idle. It is not a dual wall pipe. Answered that call a million times. We used to joke about lighting cigarettes off them.

On a dual wall exhaust pipe you never see the inner pipe glowing.

Unless it looks like this...then you have an issue.

 

My 2013 Street Bob with a 103" did the same till I made changes to the AFR's.. Not sure about the Power Commander V but with my Power Vision-2b and a computer you can shut down closed loop and configure your AFR's at 750,1000and 1125 rpm's to run at 13.6:1 or what ever you want instead of the factory open loop of 14.6.. It will help to improve Idle quality as well as decreasing heat...

 

It's an air cooled motor, and when standing still, you've restricted its cooling system. Go ride it.