Making Custom Pipes From Your Stock Pipes
Get some new Baffles for the Pipes
I tried in vain to find some baffles that would fit inside my 3" pipes. Most places sell 1.5" to 2" baffles. The price ranges are from about $3 for JC Whitney up to as much as you have in the bank for some of the really custom jobs. Someghow I could not see spending $100 apiece for baffles so I decided on the Samson 10" long, 2.25" diameter baffles. I got them at Go Motorcycles.Com and bought The A-116 Pipes for only $21.55 each. I heard good things from the HD riders about their Samsons, very good quality and will last a lifetime. I figured I would get these and just go buy some muffler adaptors to fit them into my pipes. Not! Here we went again, 3" is the OD of the pipe and all the auto parts stores don't carry anything that will fit snuggly inside a 3" pipe. Grrrr. Then I got a brainstorm, I went down to the local Midas Muffler shop and the guy there made me two of the prefect sized adaptors I needed. I took both pipes and baffles in and he custom made them on his pipe bending/stretching/cutting machine. This took him all of 15 minutes and he only charged me $10. Outstanding! They fit like a glove, nice and snug and the perfect length I wanted.
Here is a picture of the Samson Baffle screwed into the pipe adaptor he made for me. I only had to drill a small 1/4" hole in the adaptors so the supplied button head bolt would hold the baffle in place. The baffle itself had a nice welded nut in it so it snugged down very nicely.
The next step was to screw the new baffle assemblies into the pipes. I drilled two small (1/8") holes into each pipe about 1.5" from the end of the pipes and about 1.5" apart, parallel to the end of the pipe. This picture shows how I used the rectangular Triumph Stamp in the pipe as a reference point. I also figured how they would align when installed so the screws would not show. I wanted them to be on the inside parts of the pipes and not easily visible. I then took a very sharp dry-wall screw and tapped a slight dimple into the chrome first (to avoid cracking/flaking the chrome while drilling as well as getting a good start with the bit) and used a carbide tipped drill bit. I also had the baffle assemblies inside and positioned correctly so the holes would line up correctly. I drilled the first one, inserted a small stainless sheet metal, self tapping screw into the first hole, then repeated for the second hole. After both were done I tightened them up so there was no movement from the baffles.
On to the next step, Not done yet!
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