A Blacktop Installation Feature:
Wrapping Pipes on “Down Payment Blues”.
T-Bone’s bike gets wrapped up with Heatshield Products’ Cobra Skin Exhaust Wrap.
I have been meaning to do this for a while. It was only a week when my bike was re-built after getting knocked around on the 91 Frwy back in 2006, when I was wiping my bike down after riding a short distance to the meet-up point for a daylong ride out to Julian. As I was wiping down the seat with some ProtectAll, the micro-fiber towel ran across the hot chrome heat shield on the rear cylinder head pipe. Immediately it burnt to the chrome and has been there ever since. I always like the look of a wrapped pipe so I called Steve at Heatshield Products. They have several cool exhaust wrap products. We dig the color of the Lava Wrap but for this application, the black Cobra Skin Wrap would work the best.
I don’t know what I was thinking. Maybe I wasn’t. But, I thought we would wrap the pipe while it was still on the bike. Billy set me straight and told me we would have to take the pipes off. I am running Samson True Dual exhaust head pipes with Kerker Fishtails under the bags. This project actually helped solve a problem I had anyway. With the help of my buddy Carl Croy at Cyclepath Cycle, he fixed me up with a new left side fender/exhaust bracket. Something weird about these Road Kings, the left side bracket always breaks at the 90° to the under bag bar and exhaust bracket. This is the third one I have gone through at only 65,000 miles. Carl fixed my last one with a nice beaded weld, and it broke again, right next to the weld. Interesting to know the weld held up, and he says he’s not a good welder. I’d say that’s pretty damn good. Anyway a quick trip to Cyclepath and we gots ourselves a new bracket.
The head nuts were coming off pretty good until we got to the lower rear cylinder nut. The head bolt is pointed directly at the tight bend of the head pipe to exit to the left side. I called Carl to see if he has any tips. He said a long extension and a half inch socket should get to it easy. Not on this bike. We tried a universal joint socket, a cabled socket extension to get around that damn pipe. Great to have a son with good tools. Billy grabs the half inch crowfoot wrench and I slip it in and twist away. Once it cracked it was an easy exit.
On the front pipe we had to remove the right side floorboard to get it out. What a pain. 65,000 miles of road grime proved the two bolts at the pivot point to be a knucklebreaker. Finally off, and the entire exhaust assembly comes out with ease.
Get To Wrappin’ Already.
Taking a glance at the packaging and clear instructions, I opt to soak the wrap a bit in a bucket of water. I prefer starting with the harder job. We started by removing the rear pipe, so let’s wrap the rear pipe first with all it’s twists and bends. [In hind-sight, I suggest starting with the right pipe. We had a 25′ roll and came up a bit short at the end which you will see a solution we feel pretty good about.] The wrap went really smoothly as Billy was holding the pipe steady as I wound the Cobra Skin as tight as possible with about a 1/4 inch overlap (more in the curvy areas). As we finished it off at the slip-on Kerker, we cut it, banded it and went to the right side pipe. This pipe is straighter and a bit longer. I was hoping we would have just enough wrap. I found it interesting that on the long straight parts, I couldn’t get a “bubble” out of the wrap. So I folded it up on the back sided to ‘catch up’ to the wrap. If that makes any sense. Sure enough, I shouldn’t have been so cheap or maybe paid better attention to what I was doing on the other pipe as I ran out about 6 inches short on the pipe. If I would have started with this side (especially since it is the side sitting high when on the kickstand). But I found a cool solution. I took the tail end of the old chrome heat shield cover, cut it and banded it to the pipe at the end. The band stay on the inside of the cover had broken off so for the time being, I strapped a band around the cover. I may even paint it wrinkle finish black when all said and done.
All-in it was a two and a half hour job.
We finished up right in time for me to clean up and head out to Long Beach for my Mercifuls Car Club meeting. The wrap was still wet, so when the bike was warming up, the damn thing was steamin’ all over the place. I jump on and head out on the highway. At each stop sign the steam and smoke from the fresh wrap was crazy. Here I am sitting at a stop light just enveloped in a steamy stinky haze. On the freeway it was no problem and when I pulled up to Cirivello’s the think sat there smoldering. Jack asked me if I noticed any performance changes. I didn’t think about it, but yesterday I put nearly 90 miles on it going out to Ontario and back, so I understood how the bike performed before the change and I truly have to say I felt a bit more torque in the middle band of horsepower.
I will have to do something about that damn curved pipe under my left thigh though. The wrap didn’t quite keep that tight bend right out of the rear head cool enough. Maybe I will strap some of their Heatshield Armor on that bend. That should do the trick. Stay tuned.
I’d ask you what you think of it, to start some dialog, but honestly, it’s my bike and I dig it.
You may notice we use Dark Light nitrile gloves by Adenna when we are working in the garage.
