Triumphrat

Florian

The sun is out, the snow is gone, passed the MOT yesterday - may the bike season begin!!!

To add to my excitement, I just ordered some Triumph offroad silencers and a fitting K&N airfilter for my beloved 96 Tbird :-D

I guess I read all the related threads on this forum and came to the conclusion, that drilling my stock pipes would not really be an option (two left hands).

Now, due to my indicated limited technical skills, I was wondering if anybody here already performed these mods on his/her bike AND would like to share this experience with me.

Apart from the fitting of the parts, I was also wondering if I would have to adjust the carbs in any way.

Got the Haynes manual BTW, but I'd be surprised if this is explained in there.

Thanks in advance you lot and RIDE ON

Rhinoe

Fitting the silencers is a no-brainer. Loosen the clamp holding the silencer onto the pipe, take-out the bolt holding the silencer onto the passenger foot-peg mount, wiggle the stock silencer off, and install the new one. Easy.

Putting a new K&N filter in the airbox is more tricky (I am assuming you got the panel filter that fits in the airbox - not the individual pod filters). You need to take the carbs off in order to get the airbox out. You can search this forum for advice on getting the carbs out. It is not really hard, but can get frustrating. It does get much easier the more you do it. Once you get the airbox out, you can see that it is in two "halves" held together by about 6 screws. They should be "torx" head screws, so make sure you have the right tools. Hopefully you will be able to simply take the screws out, (opening the airbox) remove the old filter, put in the new one, and screw it back together.

HOWEVER, the last airbox I bought had the screws "locktighted" and I could not remove them. The screws would just turn in the housing. I do not know how to open these. I returned it and kept my old box. Does anyone have any advice for opening these airboxes?

You will want to re-jet. I cannot help you here, as I have Keihin carbs and am in the middle of finding the correct combination of jets for my bike right now.

Someone here will be able to help you. Try searching. I know the answer is out there.

Sorry I could not help you more.

- Ryan

Jodel

Florian,

Just in case you didn't pick up on the significance of what Ryan said;

"take-out the bolt holding the silencer onto the passenger foot-peg mount"

Don't try to remove the two Allen headed bolts which attach the silencer to the black metal bracket which mounts on the foot peg. The captive nuts in these silencers are notorious for becoming a little less captive than one would like and you can end up with spinning nuts - a condition not to be recommended. Sometimes the bolts undo with no problem, but I wouldn't take the chance on being able to keep your nuts nice and tight. :razz:

If you have ordered new TOR silencers, I'd spend an extra few bucks and buy two new mounting brackets and four Allen bolts at the same time (cheap items). This means you don't have to mess around trying to release your present silencers from the bracket and risk the dreaded spinning nut syndrome!

ecrabbit96

Jetting will be required with both of these mods done together. Just the TORS alone you can get away with a pilot adjustment, add the K&N and you need to jet.
I purchased my kit from ma's cycles (they are online), and have the kit specific for the tripples. Currently I am running the TOR's only. Carbs have stock pilots (38) opened slightly from the stock (2turns) to (2.5 - 3) turns, and the 100 main jets from the kit, up 2 from the 98's that came stock. My needles are on the second clip from the top. The kit comes with instructions and start points for settings. I have not dyno'ed the bike yet, but this setup will run the bike pretty well and the dyno will show the fine tuning once run. Be careful with the float adjustments they refer to, that is very hard to do, I recomend you leave them where they are. I have not added the K&N to the mix yet, but will be doing so before I ride this year. I expect this will justify the use of the 40 pilots that come with the kit, but cannot confirm this yet. I can confirm that the 40's are too big for TOR's only. Once done you need to sync the carbs and tune the pilots for proper idle. Sounds like a major deal but it's not, take your time and pay attention to details, nothing should require excess force.
If the plugs are still in the pilot screw holes, drill a small hole through the plug which is not very thick, turn a sheetrock screw into the hole so its tight, and pull it out with pliars. This wil expose the brass pilot screws.

flybiker251

I have fitted the TOR's and K&N filter to my Legend. To stop most of the popping on deceleration I rejetted the pilot jets. I replaced the pilots with the #42 jets. This allows you to decel without a lot of banging, some admit to liking the sound. My bike accelerates smoothly and quickly with no flat spots all the way to redline. I would hardily recommend the change. I have been told to heat the screws holding the brackets to the silencers to keep the internal nuts from coming adrift. I haven't tried this but have been told that it softens the locktite type compound and allows the screws to back out without breaking the nuts loose. Just a thought.
Flybiker :razz:

Rhinoe

Good points about the brackets attached to the silencers. For some reason I was thinking the Off-Roads came with brackets - I should have known better. I would get some more brackets to go with the new silencers to avoid the "loose nut syndrome."

ChiefTBS

I din't fit a K&N, just D&D mufflers last year, and no re-jetting was needed as I used the stock pipes. This fall, I will take the plugs out and inspect them for jetting needs. And what Jodel said is really real. The main reason I replaced my mufflers was because I screwed up the stock muffler's captive nuts. Of course now I ride a motorcycle, not a vacuum cleaner, which is what a stock TBS sounds like.

Florian

Thanks a lot everybody for your comments.

So, just to recap:

I have now ordered additional brackets and allen bolts to avoid the risk of spinning nuts :wink: and I have understood that carbs could be left untouched if I only were to fit the TORs.

However, fitting the K&N airfilter would neccessitate modifying the carb settings - this is the bit, where I get a bit lost:

I understand that you can buy whole sets (e.g. Dynokit) specifically for the TBird which would cost me another USD 150.

Is this purchase unavoidable, i.e. would you not be able to adjust the settings of the Mikunis to counterbalance the extra amount of air or would it make no sense without a dynokit as you wouldn't gain anything performance-wise without such a kit?

Thing is, if I have to fork out another USD 150 added to the 60 of the filter, let alone installing the bits n pieces on the carbs which are anyway a ***** to get to plus finetuning the setting on a dyno at a garage in order to gain 5HP, I might as well return the airfilter and invest in some "go faster stripes" :hammer:

Decision, decisions...

ecrabbit96

I hear what you are saying, seems like a lot bucks for marginal bang. I look at it this way. I like the sound of the TOR's, adding them has an impact on the flow of the machine. Yes you can set the bike up so it will run with all stock components, but you don't optimize the flow. The K&N is a good investment in my opinion. If you maintain it, you should never have to replace it, so you can spend the cost of a stock filter every couple of years and have paid for the K&N after 2 or three filters. This also impacts your flow. Gaining 5 hp doesn't seem like much in nascar terms, but is noticable on a bike. Optimizing these bikes with these two mods is about as far as I need to go, no cams for me. The idea is to have near perfect air/ fuel ratio throughout the rpm's and changing any of these components affects that. So to add TOR's to an otherwise stock engine actually decreases performance, just so slightly it is not noticable, and because it sounds faster already. So I will add the K&N and dyno tune once, after that the settings should remain for a long time with no further mods. I'm dynoing the bike not for the 5 hp, but for the a/f ratio to give my bike a longer life. Any hp gains are just a bonus. Again this is how I look at it.

Rhinoe

EC,

You are speaking my language. At this point I could (almost) care less how much HP my bike has . I just want it to run as well as possible. I too am trying to get my A/F ratio as optimal as possible. Good luck.