At Froggy, Yep yellow spring! Damn, I like the feel of the low though. Seems more planted and aggressive. One of my Buells is a 2003 XB9SL and it acts like the cute little girlfriend that likes to FU**. May seem like a crude comment but hey the bike likes to GROOVE.
Got that out of the way, time for new headers. They're not perfect, but I think they'll work. Still need to add O2 sensor bungs, probably going to polish out the welds while it's off again.
Even works with a stock muffler. Won't be on there long, just had to test fit and take a pic for reference. Fits me a lot better with the taller suspension. Swapped forks, shock and stand, also put on a newer front rotor.
Just a bad ground is all that was, had to add an extra one just for the fuel pump to prime. The tail section only has 2 bolts in it, both are only finger tight.
The spacers, they're about an inch tall? Yeah, looks like that's on there, what's the purpose for them? I guess it's to raise the end of the tail even higher? Guess if that's the case, they're coming off tonight then. No washers on there that I recall, but it might have something there, I don't know.
I have no baseline, I think the bike has 30k on the clock, so if it makes anything over 80 hp at the wheel, I'll be happy. I bought it more as a test fitting jig than anything else, I don't expect a lot out of the bike itself. If it runs ok, I'm happy. I've already made some of the expense back, it will pay for itself eventually. I figure if I sell a few headers, it's paid for.
That changed the look of the rear some, got to talking with someone earlier today and now it looks like we have a swap in progress going 3 different directions. One guy wants a firebolt tail, the other guy wants a lightning tail, I want a stock cheese grater and have the chopped tail to swap, along with the low seat for a city-cross seat. Trading is pretty brisk for these. I did find out that the seat rails on mine are a little worn out at the bolt holes for the tail section that holds the brake light. Either going to drill & tap to the next larger size or weld the holes up, drill and tap to the right size and then powder coat it all again.
Got to looking at the tires on the xb, I think I need to spring for a new set before next year's riding season really starts up. I'm thinking I'll probably go with a set of BT-S20's for both of my bikes. Been running BT-016's for the last 3 years and have been pretty happy with them, the S20 is supposed to be the next gen or upgrade.
Back on topic, that header looks amazing! cant wait to see the dyno numbers.
What diameter are your new headers? We found on our race XB's that going too large (48mm) onXB12 headers actually lost power on stock displacement engines (even with other tuning) so 45mm ID was about the biggest you would want to go to on an otherwise stock sized motor.