When a motor of any sort, in specific the HD motors are back firing, does that harm the engine or any engine components, such as valves, etc? The reasonI ask is becasue my Nighty back fires after I put on the stage 1 works, but I actually like it and would only want to prevent it if it causes harm to the engine.

 

Responses from the engine/fuel/exhaust system are an indication that something needs attention.
Will it hurt anything....not likely......but your machine is telling you "fix me" !

 

So that is exactly the question, is backfiring a response that is bad or good.

 

Hey are you talking decel poping or back firing at start up, Mine has back fired at start up and that sounds real bad for the motor. I see alot of talk on here about decel poping and nobody seems to say it will hurt aything. And I don't like it either, mine does that very little. I would agree it is telling you to fix it. Good luck and be safe. Tom

 

Well it only does it on decel, not when i satrt it up. I have no problem with it, actually think it is cool, just dont want it to hurt my bike, that wouldnt be cool.

 

My 06 ran like crap with a stage 1 with major decel popping. Too lean I was told. I put in a V&H fuelpac & it ran much better but still had some popping. V&H informed that 06's & the fuelpac were not compatible with a stage one & to reflash the ECU back to stock. I did the reflash & the scoot has never run better. Problems all solved.

 

About backfiring if thats the case, make sure you back off on the throttle when shiftinggears or you will get a loud backfire. This is normal.

 

Cut the beans out of your chili. Beans in chili is a major faux pas anyway. That aside, it sounds like you need a SERT or a PCIII.

 

Doing engine diagnosis via forum is always a haphazard thing, but here my two cents.
"Back Firing" is usually gasoline injected in the cyulinder that doesn't get ignited (because throttle is off and the ECU cuts ignition) and pumped into the exhaust manifold (actually a tube on a V-twin) and there ignited by the high temperatures present in the tube.
This will usually do no harm to the engine, per se, but it's an indicator that something is not properly set up.
It may also happen at startup when gas is pumped into the exhaust and there ignited by the hot gases of the first ignition of a cylinder. Depending on how much time the engine ran without ignition, it may be a simple pop or a loud bang.
Start up backfiring shouldn't happen at all on an EFI engine.
Moreover, depending from its intensity and how often does it happen, backfiring may damage the tubes and it will surely damage any catalytic exhaust, as crude (unburned) gas will go into the catalyzer, "poisoning" it.
So, if you have a carb fed engine, startup backfiring may happen, as may happen upon throttle release.
With an EFI, for what I know of generic engine behavior, startup backfiring shouldn't happen at all. It may happen upon throttle release, especially if the ECU was set up with a conservative rich mixture upon throttle release to preserve the engine (or, in some cases with turbocharged engines, it's done on purpose as an anti-lag system) or if the engine runs too lean on release.
This will be usually due to very little gasoline quantities, and shouldn't cause any damage.
A lot of engines do pop upon throttle release, only we don't hear it as it is muffled by current politically correct exhausts most cars have.
On a bike, which usually lacks a catalyzer, it's louder, and we can hear it.
Both my wife's stock Z4 and my tuned Mitsubishi Evo IX do pop on throttle release, and the former has been running flawlessly for three years and over 15 thousand miles, and the latter for a year and roughly the same mileage.
So, if you got release popping, tell your dealer (or whoever did the upgrade) but don't sweat it.

 

If you did a Stage 1 and didn't get a race tuner of some type you probably should re-map with one. Thundermax is probably the best out there.