In general I have been very happy with the performance of the stock V Star 1300, but having been riding it for a while now and getting used to all its little nuances I did decide it could do with a little boost in the low end as I felt I was having to exert a little too much clutch control a little to early and too often when slowing down and when in traffic and a bit of extra torque and rumble wouldn't go amiss either. So I decided it was time for a set of after market exhausts which would give me what I wanted and would also give me that sweeter Harley like exhaust note. My first thought was Vance and Hines as they have probably the best reputation and I have had them before on my V Star 1100 and was happy with them, plus they are easier to get here in the UK. However V&H only do a 2into1 for the 1300 and I am not overly keen on that look and wanted to replace my stock 2into1 with a 2into2.

The next most popular seems to be Cobra , and they have a good choice of exhausts for the 1300 and the sound seemed to be what I wanted. I did initially want the Slashdowns but these proved very elusive and no-one had any as they are very popular it seems, one of my suppliers Eastern Cruisers  told me he could get a set of speedster longs, so I went with that. Unfortunately after they had been fitted it turned out they had had got me the shorts, but I decided to suck it down after all the hassle getting them, I will get a set of slashcut tips to achieve the look I want.

In addition I also got the FI2000 digital fuel processor, which is supposed to provide better throttle response, no backfiring and smoother cruising and you need one of these with after market exhausts.

Anyway, the result of these exhausts + FI2000, I have no idea how the exhausts perform without the F2000 or how the FI2000 performs with the stock exhaust.

PROS

They sound great, much better than stock and are LOUD if that is what you like, at least to the human ear they sound very loud. I have recorded the exhaust note which you can hear in the video below, but it really doesn't sound anywhere near as loud in the video and it doesn't do them justice, you need to hear them in the flesh.

Performance wise there is a definite improvement in the low end, exactly what I wanted in fact. More torque and less clutch control required. You can go faster in lower gears (easily 30mph in 1st, 60mph in 2nd), slower in higher gears, so you no longer feel like you are going to stall if you don't get down to first gear quick enough or when doing a hill start.

CONS

While I do love the sound in general and it is useful for "being heard" and tearing up the neighbourhood, I do find it an annoyance on the motorway which is where you appreciate the much quieter note of the stock exhaust, especially on long journeys where you just want to chill out. After an hour or more riding I am usually half deaf. It would be nice to be able to switch between quiet and loud whenever you wanted, like the peacemaker pipes from national cycle, but I wasn't brave enough to buy those :-)

In the high end (70mph+) I have lost some torque and performance. Previously I have had this baby at 100mph with more to go. With the cobra exhausts and FI2000 I was at full throttle by the time I got to 100mph. I will be giving the FI2000 pots a tweak to see if I can fix this, I will report back when I have done it, but in general the low end performance improvements are more important to me as I spend more time driving at 30-40mph than I do at 100mph and I have used to it by now anyway :-)

There is also increased vibrations. My mirrors now vibrate, even at low speeds, they did not do this before. I also cannot ride so long without a break now, but I am more sensitive to the vibrations than most, so others may not notice this.

If you want to hear how they sound, check out my video on youtube.

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