Hi all, has anyone experiences failures of the welding holding the exhaust cross pipe stubs to the exhaust pipes? We recently had a road trip and the California Touring suffered a weld failure on the left hand exhaust cross pipe stub. this is the second time it has happened on this motorcycle. (the bike sounded like a Harley, but luckily, still ran like a Guzzi!)
We suspect that the left hand exhaust pipe was secured at the cylinder head end slightly out of position and then the cross pipes clamp, under the clutch, was tightened after forcing the pipes together. This left the cross pipes under tension and the weld on the left hand side was the first point to fail.
We are going to loosen off the whole system and see if we can re-align everything with the result of the cross pipes sitting snuggly in their correct positions. If we can achieve this we will then have the left hand cross pipe re welded into position.
However if anyone lets us know that this type of failure is common we will have to think of another, long term, solution. One though is to fit a flexible section between the two cross pipes.
Any thoughts, comments or suggestions would be welcomed.
Cheers
Phil