I got a RB Racing pipe a little over a year ago and the rear-most (Grade 8) bolt that mounts to the transmission snapped off internally twice. I was able to get it out both times but after the second time when the exhaust header stud broke and I had to retap the cylinder, decided there was a problem with the way the mount worked. I figured the long bolts with spacers were cantilevering too much weight out and that the mount should be tighter up to the transmission using shorter bolts. I Frankensteined together a new bracket using the part that connects to the pipe from RB and the part that connects to the transmission from a Stealth Pipes bracket and this seemed to work fine for the past year or so. A month and a half ago it was cracking so I welded and reinforced it with a buddy's help, then it completely broke in two a couple weeks later in a new spot so we re-welded it, and now I see that it's cracking again in another spot. This is my daily driver and it seems I'm just waiting for the damn pipe to fall off on my way to work some day.

I am running the Glide Pro stabilizer system front and rear, could this be the problem? Any other suggestions? Does anyone else have experience repeatedly breaking exhaust mounts? Has anyone else run Glide Pro with a RB mounting bracket and NOT had a problem?

 

What does the bracket look like? Does it attach at the cone, too?

 

Well, I'm a moron.

I got to taking the pipe off to see what was what and realized the cracking is just in the multiple layers of paint over the previous welds. This is good though... now I can start figuring out my charging issues. Doh. Thanks for the response.

 

Your continued breakage issue is a sure sign it's time to replace the rear iso bushings, get the stiffer front motor mount and replace the adjustment links, bite the bullet and get busy the whole engine cradle system is tired and she's shaking herself apart. Bike's overall handling will perk up too.

 

Yeah, I think it's got to be the stiffness of the Glide Pro at this point. I'm going to go back to OEM system and get a new RB bracket. Hopefully that solves the problem and it doesn't feel too sloppy after riding on this stiffer setup for so long.

 

With the old factory stuff I couldn't keep pipes on my 82 FXR till I made everything out of 3/8" plate stock or 5/8" round for the support brackets. Some header systems have such heavy resonate vibration not much isn't going to break on the old frames. Thunderheaders come to mind.

 

Like he said. On my '85 FXRS I've broken a bunch of exhaust pipes, brackets...you name it. Trying to get too many miles out of the original factory "cradle system" creates issues that I wasn't aware were even happening.

 

Updating here since I've had a couple people DM me about it.

I finally switched to a 507-1NS Barry front mount and ARP hardware for the bracket mounting.

For FXR (might be the same for any Evo but double check) you need 5/16-18 x 3.5" bolts which is ARP part number 641-3500. This is black hardware but they also make stainless.
Here's a link to the motor mount:
https://novibration.com/products/bon...ts-500-series/

So far this is working and I'm hoping I finally have this problem beat.

 

If you attach yer exhaust to the Frame on any RubberGlids...In Any Way (certainly that stupid Donut the MoCo had early on...yer gonna break exhausts...

 

Yeah I had a few people recommend that kind of system as a remedy and it just seemed like a surefire way to break something else.

I should've mentioned in my last update that I ordered a new RB mounting bracket and the hardware suggestion listed is for use with their system, not the Frankenstein thing I made (which did eventually break, haha).