The other day I did the baffle removal mod using
advice from this forum. I’ve seen the instructions many times, but never pictures so I’m posting some hoping it might help someone else.
Step 1 is to drill through the flange at the end of the baffle (Figure 1a and 1b). I used a 1 1/4" hole saw in my variable speed, reversible drill. I originally bought the hole saw from Ace hardware to drill a hole in a stainless steel sink. Just chuck it up, stick in the end of the pipe, and drill until you get through the flange. Took me < 30 seconds per pipe.
Step 2 is to break the two welds holding the inside of the baffle. As others suggested, I held a socket with channel locks against the flange I just finished drilling through, then I hit the socket with a hammer a few times (see Figure 2).
(That’s chrome-plated channel locks holding a chrome-plated socket in the end of chrome-plated pipe in front of a chrome-plated wheel. Too bad my driveway isn’t chrome-plated.)
I didn’t feel the welds snap when hitting with the hammer. Rather I could just see the socket slowly going into the end of the silencer with each hit. I used a 15/16” socket because that’s the first one I grabbed that fit over the end of the baffle's pipe. I think I should have used a slightly smaller socket because the 15/16" socket just fit over the flange I just cut with the hole saw and the socket got stuck on one of the pipes.
Step 3 is to remove the baffles. Most of the other instructions I've read said to use needle-nose pliers or something to remove the insulation, then drill more holes for the broken welds to come through. But I read one post that suggested using a 13/16” EZ-out and the whole thing would come out in one piece. I don’t have that big of an EZ-out but this technique sounded much easier than drilling more holes. I figured I could find something that would fit in my dill that I could wedge into the end of the baffle pipe. I found that a 3/4" spade bit fit right in there. To give the spade bit something to grab onto, I used needle-nose vice grips to de-round the end of the pipe (see blurry Figure 3a).
I stuck the spade bit in the de-rounded pipe, held on tight to the drill, and pulled the trigger. After a few spins forward and backward, I started to pull and the baffle pipe, with the insulation and the wire wrap, came out pretty much in one piece. It seemed to come out easier with the drill running forward (see Figure 3b).
Figure 3c shows the baffle after I was able to pull everything out.
Figure 4 shows the two inner welds that had to be busted in step 2.
Here’s before and after recordings of the sound the pipes make:
Stock T100 silencers with the rear baffle
Stock T100 silencers without the rear baffle
I recorded these lo-fi sound files using my PDA about five feet behind my T100 with the PDA on the ground.
The sound difference isn't huge, but they seem more "growly" without the baffle and at least you can hear the pipes over the engine noise now. I'm happy with the results and this was teh easiest mod I've done except for removing the reflectors off the rear fender.
Linear Mode
