An Exhausting Note from Tail Gunner

My friend Tom called me an all too common problem with Harley Baggers! A broken exhaust! It all started on a ride to Reno one year, where we happened to notice that the left rear muffler bracket (also the bag support) had broken at the rear where the muffler mounts. 

The weight of the muffler, over time, had completely torn the cross over header apart. He had been complaining of power loss and noise for a while, surprise! This is what happens when you don’t periodically check things. The weight of the muffler stress cracked the header at the cross-over, along with some corrosion; the old girl just couldn’t hang on anymore.

I contacted Bandit, who in turn contacted Bikernet.com staff member Ben Lamboeuf, who contacted Angela Kearney at J&P Cycle in Amoroso, Ia. We discussed all the options for replacement and decided that the Cobra True Duals was the answer for Tommy’s problem. Cobras True Dual kit comes with everything less the mufflers, you use your own mufflers for this application.

J&P Cycle was fantastic, they had the exhaust headers shipped pronto, and off to races we went. Naturally, the first thing was to remove the old exhaust from Tom’s 2007 FLHX, Here are a couple of shots of the damage. Note the cracked left side bag/muffler bracket that started this ball rolling.

Tom’s a man of many talents, so no new bracket for him, just clean and weld it up. No show bike here, just a rider. We also discovered, in the removal of the stock exhaust, the stock little 90* rear pipe support had also broken from vibration and weight. Again, Tom hit it with the welder, a little grinding and some paint to slow down corrosion, and good as new.

Now for the fun stuff! We took inventory of the new Cobra headers from J&P Cycle, and oddly enough, we read the instructions, WHO DOES THAT? In this case, it helped a lot. So here we go, removed the right side floor board for easy access. Removed the old exhaust port gaskets and cleaned the port gasket surface with steel wool.

Tom still used his O2 sensors, so make sure you either reinstalled them on the new headers or blocked off the holes with bungs purchased at J&P Cycle.

 

Also, we disconnected the battery before welding, for safety and access to the rear header hanger bracket, which will be replace with the one supplied in the kit from Cobra.

We started with the right side front header. We removed the snap ring and exhaust flange from Tom’s stock pipes, and reinstalled them on the new ones. Make sure the grove for the snap ring faces the exhaust port for proper fitment.

We carefully moveed the header in place and mounted it loosely for now. Then we slid the stock hanger bracket on and mounted it loosely to the transmission.

 

 

 

Now, you can slide your muffler on and again, position it and mount it loosely. Once you have everything hung and fit checked, you can start tightening it all up. We started at the exhaust flange, snugged the two ½-inch nuts, so that the new crush washer seats snug to the header flange (we don’t want any leaks). Don’t over tighten the nuts, or you may snap an exhaust head stud. WE DON’T want that! Now, move to the pipe support hanger on the transmission and tighten it. Position the muffler so that it rides on the expansion at the end of the new pipe and tighten the clamp and the two ½-inch bolts on the rear hanger. Front was done!

 

 

Now, for the rear, much the same concept. With the rear header, there was more to do. We kept the heat shield on during installation for protection. Also the new hanger clamp supplied needed to be installed prior to mounting to the engine.

 

 

Also, there was a new rear hanger bracket, which needed to be installed where the stock one was. Read the directions! It only fits one way properly. Remember we disconnected the battery; you will also need to remove the cables and nut from the starter motor to gain access to the bracket mounting bolts, which hold up the starter motor also.

No big deal, just a mildly time consuming. The new bracket went on without a hitch! We reinstalled the starter cable and then we started the installation procedure over. We moved Tom’s new header into position and loosely started the two ½-inch nuts at the flange.

 

Next, we slid the supplied clamp over the stock pipe hanger (that we reused) and mounted it to the new rear bracket. Now, slide your muffler on and position it, so that it also rides on the expansion at the end of the new pipe.

We made sure Tom’s mufflers were even at the rear of the bike. We repeated the tightening sequence, exhaust flange, support clamp, muffler. Check the rear pipe all over for clearance; make sure there’s no contact to frame or electrical components. In Tom’s case, we reused his Super Trap mufflers, they were in good shape, and he liked them. After we checked everything for tightness and clearance, we fired the bike up, WOW! Sounds awesome!

 

 

He mentioned how quiet it was in general. I have no doubt, since his system is no-longer blowing exhaust out leaks at the rear junction! Tom will have to make a few adjustments to his Super Traps to see where it performs the best; he already has a stage one map on the ECM. Cobra suggests a carb kit or EFI programmer, both available through Cobra and J&P Cycle. On my scale of 1-through-10 (beers), this was a four-beer install, easy as pie! Probably only a two, but what the hell, Tom had plenty of beer! The Cobra True Dual kit comes with everything you need, rear bracket, heat shields, clamps and rear hanger clamp. Contact J&P Cycle for all your exhaust needs, I do, and have for the past 20 ears.

 

Special Thanks goes out to J&P Cycle for their help and generosity. Angela, thank you so much!

 

—Tail Gunner out!

 

 

Our buddy Craig was hanging out, pretty much no help, but good for fetching beer and comedy relief! We love you Craig!!! Gunner, over and out!