Time For A Couple Of Cans

I've ordered a new steering head kit from Pyramid, it will replace the old loose ball bearings for caged rollers and when I get a chance I'll install it. It shouldn't take too long, but these things have a habit of taking much longer than they should...

 For now the next thing to do is to fit the shiny new Black Widow exhausts. Right hand side first as I've already removed the OEM one that had rusted through. The cans and link-pipes were really well packaged, the silencers inside their own cloth bags. Included in the box was the silencer mounting strap and rubber, nuts and bolts, spacers and clamps all of a decent quality and seemingly well plated which was really nice to see. Also included was some (brief) fitting instructions, baffles for each can and a tube of Holts exhaust assembly paste. Basically, everything you could possibly need. Of course I immediately took the baffles out because of course a small capacity parallel twin is going to be as quiet as a mouse anyway.

The first silencer went on without a hitch. The mounting strap attaches quite close to the lower end of the can but once bolted up tight it seems to be mounted really solidly. When I saw how much of the silencer would be behind the strap mount I did wonder had I bought too long a can but as it turns out, it would appear not

I gave the battery a good charge whilst doing this too. Might as well be prepared! The old left-hand silencer took a fair bit of persuasion to remove, the collar bolt rounded off immediately despite numerous bastings of Silkopen so out came the Dremel and cutting disc. It didn't put up much of a fight in the end.

 
The left hand can was a little harder to put on, mainly as I was trying to get it to line up perfectly with the right one and there is a welded plate for the centre stand to rest on. Either way it's on now, even if I'm not quite happy with it's position but that can be fettled later. Time for a ride around the village.

 
So, first impression are it's quite loud. I said it's quite loud!

To the point where I'm contemplating putting the baffles back in. I am really please with the exhaust silencers themselves though, they are rather good indeed. Also in the success column must be the brakes; no pulsing at the lever whatsoever. There's not a huge amount of power, but that'll get a bit better when the pads bed to the discs. Ultimately they're ancient two pot sliding calipers so I'm not expecting the world. I am so very pleased indeed though with the new discs making all the pulsing go away though. And so will Mr/Mrs/Miss/Ms MoT Person.

Strangely, I didn't feel at all once that the steering bearings were misbehaving whilst riding. There was no point at which the steering wanted to stick, no notchiness or play in the head when using the front brake to slow down. Very strange, but I'm happy!

What's not so good is that the bike is running badly. I can barely do 50mph, bogs down instantly if you ask too much from the throttle and pops and bangs on a closed throttle quite a bit. An Investigation into the health of the carbs is next on the agenda.