Exhaust Pipe Upgrade
2001 Road King Equipped with Pipe Upgrade.
When our buddy Scott started talking about getting a new exhaust for his 2001 Road King he didn’t really want to spend much money, but he wanted a set of true dual pipes that looked and sounded good. After we stated laughing at him for wanting the world for a dollar, a challenge of sorts was made. How can we get true dual and sweet sounding mufflers on a bagger without breaking the bank?
A simple solution for the added benefits and rumble of a separated exhaust lies within the cost-effective Fullsac performance True Dual Conversion Kits. Fullsac’s two-piece conversion replaces the factory exhaust’s Y-pipe with a rear J-pipe, which directs 100 percent of the rear cylinder exhaust and heat to the left muffler where it belongs. A straight pipe on the right side finishes off the job eliminating the OEM Y-pipe altogether.
Once we replaced the plumbing upfront, we bolted on a set of the uber-sweet Von Braun Roadster Centerline mufflers in black. The USA-made 4-inch diameter mufflers feature a sleek satin finish topped off with silver accents and domed mesh end-caps, which are made of compression formed from 550-gauge stainless steel.
We banged out the pipe and muffler swap in less than an hour and found the newly separated pipes to work well in directing each cylinder’s exhaust where it should go. We really liked the upgrade in sound our Road King had once we installed the Roadster Centerlines. lt was a low and rumbly tone at idle without being over-the-top loud at full throttle.
All in all, this was a good exhaust swap that did as advertised and didn’t break the bank.
1. This is the Von Braun Roadster centerline mufflers and Fullsac Performance true dual head pipe kit awaiting installation.
2. Our victim is this 2001 Road King with a stock exhaust system.
3. We started the swap by removing the factory head pipe heat shields.
4. After spraying all of the hardware with penetrating oil we loosened up the muffler clamps.
5. The stock mufflers were removed and the head pipes were checked for any sort of cracking or wear.
6. The left side rear pipe was removed and checked for any wear issues.
7. The right side OEM cross-over pipe exhaust clamp was loosed and the joint was treated with some penetrating lube. We also loosened they pipe from the cylinder head.
8. Fullsac says the factory y-pipe can be taken off by tapping it with a mallet repeatedly.
9. We decided to expedite things with the aid of our Porter Cable 12-volt Max cordless reciprocating saw. Can you say handy?
10. One they-pipe was cut in half it easily came away from the rear cylinder.
11. At this point the lower half of the y-pipe could also be removed with nary and issue.
12. The Fullsac straight pipe was then installed in place of the factory y-pipe on the right side of the bike.
13. Once the straight pipe was in place we slid the Von Braun muffler right behind it.
14. We also secured the rear of the muffler to the bike with the factory hardware at the OEM location.
15. The left side J-pipe was installed on the rear cylinder head and left loose so adjustments could be made.
16. The left side exhaust pipe was then attached to the Fullsac j-pipe. Both pipes are anchored to the transmission mount with the OEM clamp.
17. The left-side Von Braun muffler was then attached to the stock exhaust pipe and bolted to the rear of the bag mount.
18. All of the pipe connections were aligned and snugged up to factory specs. We then installed the heat sheilds back on the pipes and it was time to ride!
By Jeff G. Holt
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