Factory exhaust replacement

Sorry for "bumping" a fairly old thread, but the day has arrived! Am in the process of installing my new V&H...have some fitment questions...Undiablo mentioned that the original studs are too short to use with V&H split collars. Despite z1 telling me "no", it is looking to my amateur eyes like "yes"...NO WAY were they going on....took a long hard look at new/old together. No appreciable difference other than length. I switched to factory split collars, and they seemed to go right in. Looked across the garage at my buddy's 82 ltd550, and the backside of the "crowns" are tight back against the front of his block. I am currenly at about 1/8" gap. hand tight now, but feels solid...first time, so forgive my ignorance, but does this look right to everybody? If correct, I will need to "hog out" the mounting slot in the muffler bracket to allow passenger peg bolt to pass through....don't want to mark/dremel hole until I am sure that the headeris installed correctly...feedback?

Sorry! One more pic...can I safely assuke that the mystery part (pictured) is a centerstand stop? Wotta newb! LOL!!! Thanx AGAIN, guys!

Bump !?

looks to be as you wrote .......center stand stop bracket :blink:

Howsabout those pipe pics? Do they look correctly installed, to a more seasoned eye?
(Guess I'll find out when I fire it up, huh?) Thanx anyway!

you should be good, as long as your sure you DONT have the flared end in the cylinder head up against some new exhaust pipe gaskets ...and after you take a few rides, check the nuts to make sure they are still tight ...Pete

Maybe this will help kzrider.com/forum/2-engine/517233-78-kz1000-exhaust-question Pete

Thanx guys...just trying not to mess anything up! Yeah, I've got all the pieces in the right order. A guy in the tech dept at v&h admitted that the original split collars should work...I was just concerned about the distance from the front of the block to the back of the crowns...as long as nothing looks off kilter to anyone, I'm gonna hog out the hole, finish this part of the project...thanx again, all! Hopefully, she will run tonight!

Grumpy Ole Artist wrote: Sorry for "bumping" a fairly old thread, but the day has arrived! Am in the process of installing my new V&H...have some fitment questions...Undiablo mentioned that the original studs are too short to use with V&H split collars. Despite z1 telling me "no", it is looking to my amateur eyes like "yes"...NO WAY were they going on....took a long hard look at new/old together. No appreciable difference other than length. I switched to factory split collars, and they seemed to go right in. Looked across the garage at my buddy's 82 ltd550, and the backside of the "crowns" are tight back against the front of his block. I am currenly at about 1/8" gap. hand tight now, but feels solid...first time, so forgive my ignorance, but does this look right to everybody? If correct, I will need to "hog out" the mounting slot in the muffler bracket to allow passenger peg bolt to pass through....don't want to mark/dremel hole until I am sure that the headeris installed correctly...feedback?

Am thinking that when the nuts are snugged, the clamp should be closer (almost touching) the head, and with the end of the stud protruding out through the nut.

In other words, when tightened, there should be very little, if any, of the stud visible between the clamp and the head.

To illustrate this, here are pics from my KZ900-B1 LTD, clamp on cylinder #1, and clamp on cylinder #4.








When the stud is clearly showing between the clamp and head, when tightened, would suspect:
(a) possibility of old gasket remaining inside the port when the new gasket was installed -- sometimes owners use two old gaskets instead of a new gasket; or
(b) split collars that are longer than necessary.

Conversely, split collars that are too short won't allow sufficient compression of the exhaust gasket.

Good Fortune!

Here's how close the "crowns" are to the head on stock KZ650 pipes. The pipes on my bike have never been removed, so this shows how they came from the factory. Ed

When the old exhaust port gasket is removed, there might be another one in there so blackened and encrusted that it's overlooked, mistakenly thinking that the second gasket is the port bed surface.

A dental pick type tool may be needed to coax the old gasket from it's encrusted position inside the port.

Good Fortune!

650ed wrote: Here's how close the "crowns" are to the head on stock KZ650 pipes. The pipes on my bike have never been removed, so this shows how they came from the factory. Ed

How did you swap out your shocks? My manual says it is necessary to remove the exhaust to access the lower shock mount bolt. At the time I thought that was a bit ridiculous, but i had an exhaust leak so it wasn't a big deal as i needed to fix that as well.