Pipes, ya, that's a tough one. The whole issue of exhaust is a complicated one for me. First, my wife absolutely hates loud motorcycles. So anything much louder than my current set up of SE Street Performance slip-on's is problematic. And quite frankly, I'm not a huge fan of really loud pipes myself.

On the other hand, it's hard to have a really bad *** Harley without some deep rumbling sound coming from the *** end. I get it. And I'd like to have it a bit louder. So right now I'm not sure what I'm going to do. I've been reading the various threads here about the various options. A complete new exhaust, as much as that would be an awesome addition to this build is just not in the cards...way too expensive on top of what I've already spent. And I haven't even sent everything off to the powder coater and painter yet. I can't afford the $400 - 800 that a new exhaust would cost.

My thought right now is to re-baffle the SE slip-ons, maybe with the Big City Thunder QQ baffles or one of the other makers out there. From what I can gather the BCT QQ's will be louder than what I've got now but maybe not so much louder that my wife goes Lorena Bobbitt on my ***...errr...well, you know.

I figure that I can always swap out exhaust down the road for something better looking and louder. But for now I'll keep the SE slip-on's and probably change out the baffles.

 

I have been thinking about welding a set of pipes together with a heat wrap covering them. After seeing this I have really looking into doing a set.

 

One of the things that has been worrying me since…oh…the day I pulled it all apart back in October, is the wiring. This rats nest chaotic conflagration called a wiring harness just screams “malfunction”, all by itself, in it’s original configuration, with no mods. We’re gonna reroute it (or at least some of it) through the frame and modify the turn signals and rear tail light. I break out in a sweat every time I look at it. When my wife saw this picture it quickly confirmed in her mind that my Nighty wasn’t going to be running again any time soon…if ever. And it’s hard for me to argue with her.


But, we press on despite her doubts and my fears.

In order to route the wires through the frame something has to be done with the large plastic electrical (deutsch) connectors used to plug in the various electrical subassemblies into the main harness. They won’t fit through the holes we have drilled in the frame to run the wires. We are trying to avoid cutting and splicing wires as much as possible so the ideal solution is to take apart the deutsch connectors, run the wires and then reassemble the connectors and wires when they are back outside the frame. So in my spare time the last few weeks I’ve been playing around, trying to figure out how to take the silly *** things apart. It hasn’t been an easy process. I know there have been a couple of threads here that discuss using a pin or needle to do it, and after going through several needles, pins, thumb tacks and other assorted sharp objects I gave up on that idea. I watched a couple of YouTube videos on the subject but there are so many different types of deutsches that those videos didn’t provide much help on the ones used by the moco. They did give me the idea of using specialized tools for the job and I managed to find a deutsch removal tool kit online that looked like it might do the trick. It didn’t. Don't waste your money.


Finally, after screwin around for hours poking and prying on the damn things, Oz the son-in-law walked over to the bench to check on my progress. Having made none, he took a look and in about two minutes of examination and another two minutes of crafting a few specialty tools out of some heavy gauge copper wire that was just laying on the floor someplace, he had one of them apart. I was so pissed. Happy that he solved another problem, but pissed that he had to figure out what turned out to be a relatively simple procedure I couldn't discern on my own. So, for those that might find themselves needing to take one of these idiot connectors apart, I’ll outline the procedure "we" came up with. Before I do, note that there are several different types of connectors in the wiring harness and I’ve only done one of the types so far. I haven’t tackled the others and don’t know at this point exactly which ones will have to be done and which ones won’t need disassembly. The ones I took apart look like this.


There are three of this type whose wires need to go through the frame – one for each of the wire runs to the right and left side of the handle bars and one for the wires to the dummy lights and speedo. They are slightly different in shape and the number of wires they contain, but the design is the same for all three and the procedure to take them apart is identical.

The tools I used are from left to right:
-- Needle
-- Two copper wire prying tools – heavy gauge, very sturdy, flattened on one end
-- Small jewelers screwdriver


Start by removing the back of the connector, a piece of plastic the wires run through and enter the back of the connector. It’s held in place by two small hooks that are molded into the plastic and engage a slot on the main body of the connector. Using your jewelers screwdriver carefully pry the body of the connector away from the hook on each side and slide the back piece away from the main body moving it back along the wires several inches out of the way.




Next, looking into the back of the connector you will notice a white piece of rubber that the wires pass through on their way to the business end of the connector. Using your screw driver, pry that piece of rubber out of the back and slide it down the wires out of the way.





Then, using your two copper wire pry tools (or anything of similar size and strength) pry off the tan color front cap of the connector. You will see two thin slots on either side of the wire holes. Each of these is connected to a hook molded into the cap that engages slots on the inside of the main connector body. Your tools have to be thin enough to fit into the slots but strong enough to pry the hooks outward to disengage the slots holding them. At the same time, while the hooks are disengaged and using your screwdriver, pry the cap upward and out of the connector.




Finally, as you look down inside the connector at the two rows of wires you will notice two rows of plastic detents running parallel and adjacent to them. Each wire has a flexible detent associated with it that holds the wire in place. In theory, or as I would describe it…once upon a time, it is said you could run a needle down through the small hole in the front cap, engage these detents and free the wires without taking off the front cap. But neither I nor my talented son-in-law could make that happen. We had to remove the front cap and then it was a piece of cake. Depress each detent and slide the wires out the back.


Take special care to document precisely where each wire goes inside the connector. Bad things will happen if you fail to do this…or so I presume. Here’s how I did mine.


For the wires running through the frame these three are the biggest connectors to take apart. There are others that may or may not have to be disassembled, I simply haven’t examined all of them closely enough yet to know if they will fit through the ž” holes we drilled in the frame to run the wires. Probably not, so that will probably be a whole nuther tale of frustration and smashed bits of metal and plastic trying to figure them out. Anyone with any insight into how to take apart the connectors for the fuel injectors, coil and such, I’m sure I’m not alone on this forum in saying – “do tell”. Anyway, here are the holes in the frame, one is high in the battery compartment going into the large down tube under the seat. The other is in the main frame tube under the gas tank right between the cylinders.



We are getting close to the point of pulling the motor back out and finishing up the frame mods. It looks like we might start that next weekend. I’ll be taking the motor straight into the paint booth to begin the refinish on that. After some more cutting and grinding and welding on the frame, it and a lot of other parts will go to the powder coater. Oz will be crafting a skid plate very similar to this one on the Sex Panther bike from over on chop cult.


We’re going to move the horn down behind that to clean up the front end a bit. He’ll also be filling some of the holes in the rear fender struts, cutting off the mid-control mounts and cleaning up a lot of the Harley frame welds that look like complete crap from the factory, filling and grinding them smooth so it looks nice under the new gloss black powder. Hopefully all that will be done in the next few weeks. Get it back from powder coater and we start the final reassembly. Still seems like a long way off…and spring is fast approaching.

 

Haha.......I scratched my head trying to figure out how to take apart those connectors...........then I looked in the manual............DUH!

 

No! The harley service manual?? You gotta be freakin kidding me...

 

^^^freaking skidplate is ******* dude! sweet little piece there man!

 

How's your sidestand going to work out Ergo?

 

Rog was right. Back of the manual has a picture of every last one of those plastic suckers, complete with a description of how to take them apart.

Someone...shoot me now.

 

Thanks bmx. We should have that done this weekend. Hopefully.

 

Well, I haven't given that much thought yet...viewing it as a somewhat minor issue, but I assume that because the bike is sitting a bit lower than stock we will either have to shorten it, bend it, or alter the angle of the mount as it comes off the frame. That's one of the things we'll have to discuss this weekend when we are supposed to finish up all the frame work. I'll let you know.