Here's one for the "for what it's worth" department; I live in a condo complex with a lot of older folks. So my biggest requirements in an aftermarket exhaust was 'not too loud'. After a lot of searching on HDF and a few outside opinions, I settled on the SE Street Cannons. I put them on yesterday and did a quick comparison using a free sound meter app on my Android smartphone....

regular 1 car garage with no sound absorbing quality.

Ambient sound.................24-25 dB

Stock pipes (at idle).........77-78 dB

Street Cannons (at idle)....81-82 dB

The Street Cannons certainly are a lot deeper in tone, but apparently not much louder. At all. They sound like a Harley should and after a 1 hour shake down cruise and then once around the complex, there were no complaints from my neighbors. At least for now.

 

Stock header with cat?

 

That is the slip on that I have on my stock header and cat exhaust. The only time they get somewhat loud to me is when the engine is under heavy load...accelerating or climbing a hill on cruise. Other than that, they have a pretty good sound. I leave the house at 0530, so a quiet exit from the neighborhood is desirable to me as well. I have had no complaints...my neighbor however has a bike with straight pipes and most people I talk to want to break his neck in the morning.

 

actually +3db is twice as loud - but stock is pretty quiet.

 

Yeah, the rest of the system (and intake-A/C) is stock.