Excerpt from: Happenings
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| June 29, 2009 | | SAE Test a Likely New Standard for Noise | If there are two things that non-riders agree on, it is that they dislike motorcycles because of 1) Loud exhausts, and 2) Lane splitting, particularly with high speed differences between the motorcycles and the cars.
I know the argument about "loud pipes save lives", but those loud pipes come at a huge cost in public relations.
Does this make a big difference? Probably not. I expect the new standard to be considered whenever legislatures discuss noise standards for motorcycles. It seems reasonable that the new standard will influence legislation.
But it seems most probable that enforcement will continue to be discriminatory, and that authorities will use loud pipes for leverage against riders that they want to ticket or stop for some other reason.
Still, it is interesting that such a large organization would come up with a noise standard for road bikes. Over time, it may focus the loud exhaust argument on the question of "how loud is loud?"
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