[Carl]

Hi all. popped into local bike shop today to buy new jacket as its my burfday. Got chatting re MOT and new tyre required etc. Service manager pipes up; “don’t forget to put the original pipes back on for the MOT or it will fail for being too noisy….” WHAT?!? He hasn’t heard the bike (I dropped in in the car for the jacket). Apparently new regs say after market exhaust should be comparable with original equipment. Ok……when I bought the bike (a 2000 Wildstar 1600A ) it had straight through pipes which could be heard from space! I replaced with very nice and not cheap V&H with proper baffles etc. But is it true that the man from the ministry has now outlawed such things? I really can’t afford or would want to find and fit an original set of 2000 wet fart pipes….Any experience of the new regs so far? Cheers all

[bronskimac]

The new testing manual says “The exhaust system and silencer should be in such condition, or of such a type, that the noise emitted from the motorcycle isn’t clearly unreasonably above the level expected from a similar motorcycle with a standard silencer in average condition”. So it’s still a judgement call from the tester. I’d try it with the exhaust you have and if it does fail, you have a few days to sort it for a re-test.
https://www.mot-testing.service.gov.uk/documents/manuals/class12/Section-8-Exhaust-noise.html#section_8.1

[Nick Wardle]

I hope not, otherwise I will have to do some serious baffling when I fit my Tailgunner next year 🙂