Pipes and Mufflers. . . Where to buy?

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Bonwit

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I'm looking to add new pipes and peashooters to my 850. I've been looking at Commando Specialists, whose prices look attractive. They offer two brands of head pipes. One is highly touted by them and made in the USA. The other is made in England by Wassell. The Wassell's are $20 more. Anyone have any experience with either of these?

As for mufflers, they only carry one. They say "made exclusively for us, all welds ground smooth before plating. Standard lug mounts and unbaffled construction!" Has anyone ordered these mufflers? What do you think? Any good? The price sure looks good at $120 a pair.

As always, thanks for your help.
 
In my experiwnce, the belled end pipes that need collets to fit into the head, always split. Better to buy the flanged type, but I wouldn,t know who sold the best ones. My pipes were the belled end type, but I have welded flanges on them years ago. I want to replace them with new flanged ones, but I am getting paranoid about buying anything new for my Commando now, because of the amount of crap that don't fit anymore.
As for the silencers (mufflers), "unbaffled"?
I have heard these on another Commando & they sound bloody awful.
Go for the straight through baffled type as the originals.
I get mine from Mick Hemmings & have always been good.
 
Commando Specialties on eBay is a straight-up vendor. I've bought lots of stuff from him and never been disappointed. I'd say whatever you get from him will be good.

Wassel stuff is top notch. I have a pair of their mufflers and I love them. They're ground smooth with no visible welds. Very pretty and nice sound.

EMGO is a popular brand, but the welds are ugly. They also tend to crack at the front weld, where the silencer meets the head pipe. Stay away from Domi Racer silencers - they're horribly restrictive.
 
I have the Wassells (head pipes and mufflers) from Commando Specialties on my 73 850. Quality and fit are quite good. (I am running these with Keihin flatslide "FCR" carbs and K&N pod filters.)

I have 750 style unbalanced head pipes, and 750 style deeper exhaust nuts. I have tightened the nuts to 60 lbs-ft, run the bike until quite hot and retightened. Did that a few times. They haven't moved since.

If I had the money, I'd go for Epco's instead, but they are substantially more.

Good hunting!
 
I bought Epco stainless silencers and the headers from Raber's. The Raber's headers are way thicker than my old original ones.
 
Flo said:
In my experiwnce, the belled end pipes that need collets to fit into the head, always split. Better to buy the flanged type, but I wouldn,t know who sold the best ones. My pipes were the belled end type, but I have welded flanges on them years ago. I want to replace them with new flanged ones, but I am getting paranoid about buying anything new for my Commando now, because of the amount of crap that don't fit anymore.
As for the silencers (mufflers), "unbaffled"?
I have heard these on another Commando & they sound bloody awful.
Go for the straight through baffled type as the originals.
I get mine from Mick Hemmings & have always been good.
Click to expand...

Okay, now I'm confused. I don't understand "straight through baffled types". Sounds like an oxymoron. I would think a straight pipe would by definition be unbaffled, but I don't know much. Are you saying the Commando Specialists mufflers are going to sound different (awful) than the original? Please explain.

Thanks
 
As near as I can tell, most of the new after market silencers are mostly baffled, but not blocked. I have the original pea shooters from my 69 'S' and they had the baffles (cut outs along the circumference of the exhaust tubes) and also had a plate near the back that blocked looking straight through the pipe. There was perhaps 1/4 to 1/2 inch of clear circumference around the block plate. I am sure this produced a lot of back pressure and reduced the sound level to some degree, but the carbs seemed to like the setup. I now have some silencers I got from Walridge but have not had running yet, and I am sure I am going to have to mess with the carbs because the back pressure will be a lot less. They have the baffles, but no blocking plate, but the welds are not apparent, and look better (smoother) than the originals. I had some Hooker headers into 1 silencer once that produced a lot of backfiring and scraped on the ground, so I got rid of that.

Dave
69 'S' project
 
Never seen a blocking plate in a peashooter, could be a USA type maybe.
If you look through the peashooter, you should see straight through. The baffles are raised cutouts on the tube that is welded from the front to the back of the inside of the silencer.
I have seen a type that has just a short tube welded from the back end of the silencer, these sounded more of a waffly sound rather than a crisp bark.
Years ago I had a couple of heavily baffled silencers, which was all I could afford at the time, they were not spefically for a Norton. They drained a lot of power.
 
Years ago one of my peashooter setups had some sort of block at the rear. They probably were to do with US sound rules.
 
Update on this post -

My brother bought a pair of Commando Specialties' mufflers for his 750 and we installed them last weekend. The finish is quite nice, though not as flawless as my Wassels. They make a NICE deep sound, and he's thrilled with the performance. His 750 seems to have come alive. A good deal all around.
 
Flo said:
Never seen a blocking plate in a peashooter, could be a USA type maybe.
If you look through the peashooter, you should see straight through. The baffles are raised cutouts on the tube that is welded from the front to the back of the inside of the silencer.
Click to expand...
Well I ordered the kit from "Commando Specialists" and it arrived the other day. The pipes look and fit great. These are the set they have made here in the USA. The chrome job appears top notch. The accompanying mufflers are made in Taiwan. To me they look good - Better than the set they are replacing. One noticeable difference is that the weld where the cone tip attaches to the body of the muffler is smoothly ground making for a nice transition. My old mufflers had a weld bead here. I'll have the left side on tomorrow and get to hear how they sound. The inside appearance is exactly as you describe, a straight through tube with baffles. I also got their wrench and clips, so hopefully it won't be coming loose again. I thought it was a heck of a deal for around $300.
 
Got the new mufflers and pipes installed. The bike sounds different - Slightly quieter, but still a nice bark. I'd describe it as being smoother. Maybe it's my imagination, but the bike seems to have more power. Is this possible?
 
Sure, the old one may have had restrictions or poor flow. Watch your plugs for a while.
 
Bonwit said:
Got the new mufflers and pipes installed. The bike sounds different - Slightly quieter, but still a nice bark. I'd describe it as being smoother. Maybe it's my imagination, but the bike seems to have more power. Is this possible?
Click to expand...

My brother says his definitely has more power. I put a set of Domi Racer silencers on my 850 a while back and immediately noticed a loss in power across the band. Norton's seem to care quite a bit about exhaust flow.
 
I'm looking for some high pipes for a project I'm working on. Any suggestions on this? Sources? Any difference between the one pipe on each side or both pipes on one side?
 
Man, I am ripped. Paid more than that for headers, silencers, shields and my L bracket has a crack in it that needs fixing and then chroming. What a bummer. Oh well. Sometimes it is best to wait until the last time, but I have not experienced that too much. I could buy the whole kit and have spares except for the bracket?????

Dave
69 'S' project
 
There is also Viking Exhaust but he's in new Zealand but could make you a one-off set of high pipes only you would have. He's kind of pricey though but that's part of the territory for custom exhaust work.
 
Thanks for the link to Commando Specialists. During my research, I remember seeing a two-into-one set of pipes that come up high and to the side. As I recall, they were black, not chrome, and made for a competition machine. Does anyone recall seeing something like this?
 
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