"But you just got that bike..."
My wife looked at me like I had just sprouted a full head of Chia hair. "You just got that bike. Why do you want to change it?" Obviously, she doesn't understand the nature of motorcycles and their owners. We are driven to tweak, to customize, to make our bike reflect our own unique personality, or at least the personality we want other bikers to see.
When I got my new VTX 1800 back in January, the first thing I wanted to do was change the pipes. The sound off the showroom
floor is non-existent. (A sewing machine is often the comparison made about the stock Honda sound, and I don't disagree.) Initially, I tried to save some money and so I had the stock pipes modified by a company in Minnesota
called VTXExhaust. When I got the pipes back and installed, I found the sound at idle and under I did some research and finally decided to go with the Vance & Hines BigShots,
with the ThunderMonster baffles. They had the look I was going for, and from what I could tell, they had that low, pronounced rumble that I wanted. As a member of the VTX Owners Association web group, I was lucky
enough to stumble on a pair of slightly used pipes, with the baffles I wanted, for a great price. Even more importantly, they were from a local guy, who offered to help with the installation. It was an offer too good to refuse. So, on a
blistering hot Sunday morning in mid-June, I putted on over to Eustis, to the home of one of the most helpful guys on the VTXOA website, Kevin Kuiper. Shortly after, the man with the pipes, Scott Wheeler showed up and we went to work.
We had some other non-exhaust related work to do that took about two hours. I expected the pipes to be the easy part.
After all, I'd put after-market pipes on my old Aero and it only took about 30 minutes, by myself, so I figured this would be a
piece of cake. Not so much. Getting to the bolts in question required some serious contortion-artist wrenching that proved to be pretty much impossible. We eventually ended up taking off the shocks, so we could drop the back end a bit.
After another two hours, just about 5 gallons of water and a minor case of heat stroke, I was ready to rock and roll, so I fired
it up. Bingo. Exactly the sound I was looking for. At speed I might not set off any car alarms with it, but if I goose it, I just might.
I took the scenic route home, down 46 to Mims and then south to Rockledge on the back roads. I couldn't help enjoying the new sound almost as much as the ride itself. Next mod: the seat. (But don't tell my wife. It's a surprise.)
throttle was great; however at speed, it was
way too quiet and had a tone I didn't like. I just wasn't happy. And as I've said before, there's nothing worse than a sad biker.
