Bling

Oil cooler creeps slowly towards installation/completion -- one part off to get machined.  Fitting the first stainless hose based on a youtube video, and surprisingly, the cutting method works well.  I'll fill you all in later.

On the "mystery gasket" front, they were new exhaust gaskets for my exhaust.  Almost secretive, the information regarding the Arrow Mini Twin Evo was hard to find.  The system was never imported to North America; the Canadian Arrow distributor had never heard of it (and tried to sell me a standard Arrow system for twice the online price), and the US distributor was not interested in trying to get ahold of one for me.  In the spirit of international commerce, I found one online from a UK shop, and purchased it.  I won't go into details about the price, but if it is the system used by racers at the Isle of Man, it must be a quality piece.

The tracking information is always interesting to see -- from the UK to Canada (Toronto) in 36 hours, and from Toronto to Brandon in... 3 and a half days!  Who cares, its here, and I have it installed.  It's a pretty cool looking piece of kit!

These headers are not typical -- note the small tube joining the two pipes near the bend towards the collector -- the newest ex650 has that on the OEM pipes, allegedly to improve torque -- to balance the exhaust gasses?  Note the welds mid-pipe -- the stacks coming out of the cylinder head taper (seamlessly) to a larger OD from the head.  I will get a caliper out and measure the difference -- but it appears to start at 1.5" and widen to 1.75".

The under-engine muffler.  A straight through perforated core... mounts to the OEM bracket, but not on the same mounts.  I earlier debated hacking those off to save weight... thankfully I never bothered.

The tailpipe -- titanium and carbon fibre!  Note the curves to add length -- I think this is why Ryan Farquar's EX650 was making so much power!  So this is the exhaust that has now officially replaced the legendary Arata system that serious racers first bought when they began to race EXs.  Of course, a dyno will be required to properly map the engine to get the most power... as it stands I will likely race it as is until the end of the season, and then coordinate some time to get it mapped properly.

Bold new graphics!