ratrap
Race Dog
- Joined
- Mar 10, 2007
- Messages
- 2,553
- Reaction score
- 3
- Location
- Central Karoo
- Bike
- Honda XRV 750 Africa Twin
Motorbikes are for many reasons inextricably linked to their exhaust pipes.
Motorbikes need exhaust pipes for many practical reasons. However an exhaust on a motorbike is different as it also has the
vital task of producing the one thing that gives a motorbike all its character. NOISE! A motorbike has to sound like a motorbike!
With few exceptions motorcyclists will tolerate all the disadvantages that sometimes go with an exhaust pipe that sounds
right. A bike that sounds right will be able to shake off any criticism relating to its other features. Its a biking rule of thumb.
Exhaust makers are few and far between. They practice an art that combines an intimate knowledge of the physics of gas flow and the art of forming metal plate and pipe into complex shapes. The product of their labour has to be pleasing aesthetically. Aesthetics and the constraints of physics are mutually exclusive. An exhaust that sounds right but looks wrong wont cut it. It has to look mean and business like. Every biker knows a good looking exhaust when he sees one. Every biker knows an exhaust that sounds right when he hears one.
I have been fortunate enough to know someone who built exhausts.
He has built me exhausts that have transformed very ordinary motorbikes because suddenly they sound right and the exhausts look right too. Shiny works of art delicately bent and shaped, the welds almost invisible. Lighter, better, louder and more handsome than the originals.
I dont know who will make me exhausts now. Brett Clarke died yesterday on my birthday. He died doing something that he
had a passion for. Motorcycling. Being an amputee did not prevent him from riding. His motorcycling exploits on "tin" legs are
legendary. I was fortunate to hear many of them first hand from Brett.
I will remember him everytime I start one of my motorbikes and hear the exhaust note or run a rag over the shiny glow of the stainless steel. You go well Brettski.
"No man is an island,
Entire of itself.
Each is a piece of the continent,
A part of the main.
If a clod be washed away by the sea,
Europe is the less.
As well as if a promontory were.
As well as if a manner of thine own
Or of thine friend's were.
Each man's death diminishes me,
For I am involved in mankind.
Therefore, send not to know
For whom the bell tolls,
It tolls for thee."
Motorbikes need exhaust pipes for many practical reasons. However an exhaust on a motorbike is different as it also has the
vital task of producing the one thing that gives a motorbike all its character. NOISE! A motorbike has to sound like a motorbike!
With few exceptions motorcyclists will tolerate all the disadvantages that sometimes go with an exhaust pipe that sounds
right. A bike that sounds right will be able to shake off any criticism relating to its other features. Its a biking rule of thumb.
Exhaust makers are few and far between. They practice an art that combines an intimate knowledge of the physics of gas flow and the art of forming metal plate and pipe into complex shapes. The product of their labour has to be pleasing aesthetically. Aesthetics and the constraints of physics are mutually exclusive. An exhaust that sounds right but looks wrong wont cut it. It has to look mean and business like. Every biker knows a good looking exhaust when he sees one. Every biker knows an exhaust that sounds right when he hears one.
I have been fortunate enough to know someone who built exhausts.
He has built me exhausts that have transformed very ordinary motorbikes because suddenly they sound right and the exhausts look right too. Shiny works of art delicately bent and shaped, the welds almost invisible. Lighter, better, louder and more handsome than the originals.
I dont know who will make me exhausts now. Brett Clarke died yesterday on my birthday. He died doing something that he
had a passion for. Motorcycling. Being an amputee did not prevent him from riding. His motorcycling exploits on "tin" legs are
legendary. I was fortunate to hear many of them first hand from Brett.
I will remember him everytime I start one of my motorbikes and hear the exhaust note or run a rag over the shiny glow of the stainless steel. You go well Brettski.
"No man is an island,
Entire of itself.
Each is a piece of the continent,
A part of the main.
If a clod be washed away by the sea,
Europe is the less.
As well as if a promontory were.
As well as if a manner of thine own
Or of thine friend's were.
Each man's death diminishes me,
For I am involved in mankind.
Therefore, send not to know
For whom the bell tolls,
It tolls for thee."
