{"id":1383,"date":"2018-10-24T10:29:34","date_gmt":"2018-10-24T10:29:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/?p=1383"},"modified":"2018-10-24T10:29:34","modified_gmt":"2018-10-24T10:29:34","slug":"loud-pipes-save-lies","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/2018\/10\/24\/loud-pipes-save-lies\/","title":{"rendered":"Loud Pipes Save Lies"},"content":{"rendered":"
A symphonic ’79 CBX with a wail as sweet as sugar…<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Air-conditioning is a luxury in my world. Compressors, evaporators, electric clutches, if that junk fails I never bother to repair it because my trucks are not worth the investment. Running without AC requires open windows and I heard the 4-cylinder sport bike coming up behind me on the left. He was about three car lengths back and well up into the RPM range. You may not like that sound but it was music to my ears.<\/p>\n

The main point is I heard him. So many motorcycle anti-noise campaigners claim that exhaust noise is one direction and useless as a safety measure. Like no one in front of you can hear your blat-blat-blat. The naysayers turn into online audio engineers describing the physics of sound and how loud pipes can\u2019t possibly alert anyone to your presence. And they are full of crap. I heard the bike coming up behind me.<\/p>\n

Go ahead and argue sound is annoying on a motorcycle. Push for better rider training. Explain to me how citizens shouldn\u2019t be disturbed from their slumber as they text down the highway running over anything not traveling their same speed and trajectory. Say that loud motorcycles are causing Cagers to dislike us and that lawmakers will try and ban us. It all may be true. Those are worthwhile arguments.<\/p>\n

But don\u2019t tell me you can\u2019t hear loud pipes. With your widows up and the stereo blazing away you probably can\u2019t but there are other, less-insulated road users that can hear the outside world. Bicyclists, walkers and people without air conditioning will be alerted to your motorcycle long before you collide with them. Electric car owners report that pedestrians wander in front of their silent rides. That kind of stuff won\u2019t happen to a drag-piped, stretched-swingarm Hayabusa spinning 9000 rpm.<\/p>\n

Loud pipes can\u2019t be both annoying and unheard on the road. The effect is even more pronounced in town: A straight-piped hog announces itself blocks away. The damn thing sounds like a bear rifling through garbage cans but I know it\u2019s out there somewhere because I can hear the big V-twin stumble and fart like internal combustion is not settled science.<\/p>\n

Sure, pipes make more noise towards the back because that\u2019s the direction they are pointed. Would it be so bad if some Whopper-eating, stereo-adjusting, GPS-programming car driver heard you a few hundred feet before running your annoying ass over? If sound doesn\u2019t equal safety then why are street-driven motorcycles equipped with horns? You can\u2019t have it both ways.<\/p>\n

The Greshqvarna\u2026.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Personally I don\u2019t like loud pipes. They wear me down on long trips so I mostly run stock mufflers. My Husky came with an aftermarket muffler that is pretty loud but I leave it on out of inertia.<\/p>\n

Has anyone\u2019s life been saved by a loud exhaust system? Who knows? It\u2019s difficult to prove a negative, something that didn\u2019t happen. Trying to work within the system or to curry favor from others by silencing your motorcycle is a mug\u2019s game. Run whatever exhaust system you prefer. Motorcycles, loud or quiet, are going to be annoying to the general public. Our very existence seems dangerous to them and their anger towards us isn\u2019t noise related. It\u2019s because we are not following the rules.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Air-conditioning is a luxury in my world. Compressors, evaporators, electric clutches, if that junk fails I never bother to repair it because my trucks are not worth the investment. Running without AC requires open windows and I heard the 4-cylinder sport bike coming up behind me on the left. He was about three car lengths … Continue reading “Loud Pipes Save Lies”<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_dont_email_post_to_subs":true,"_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paywalled_content":false,"_jetpack_memberships_contains_paid_content":false,"footnotes":"","jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false},"categories":[235,96,66,140],"tags":[373],"class_list":["post-1383","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-amazon","category-feel-good-stuff","category-joe-gresh","category-vintage-motorcycle","tag-loud-pipes"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"post_mailing_queue_ids":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1383","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=1383"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1383\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1387,"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1383\/revisions\/1387"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=1383"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=1383"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/exhaustnotes.us\/blog\/index.php\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=1383"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}