I have the longshots with the heat shield and they are turning gold right at the joint in the middle. The dealer says that this is common with these pipes and that vance & hines will do nothing about it. Does anyone else have this problem? Any solutions or products to get the chrome back?

Hey kinda funny but i had the exact same thing happen to my 05. I also have the longshots right under my passenger floor board where the pipes join about an 8 inch section on my top pipe turned a goldish yellow. was very noticable. drove me crazy. i talked to several ppl they said yellowing is a sign of running to rich?? dont know if any truth to it but bike was running very rich anyway the solution for you. beleive it or not everyone told me yellow couldnt be taken off only blue but at the local yama shop i purched a bottle of stuff called blue buster it was in a small bottle and is in powder form. you put the powder on a damp rag and polish away. talk about a big releif after a few minutes i started seeing progress. i am very satisfied now no more yellowing. by the way it was like 7.00 so whether it works for u or not it wont break you up. hope this helps

Blue Buster works and Simichrome also works nice, simichrome comes in a tube and is a polish, I use it on my stainless guns to clean the black off the cylinder.
Paul

K&N, V&H Powershots, 190DJ/DJ Pilot/2.5PMS

See Yellow Chrome forum...Pic of my KAW with V&H pipes.

I've got V&H Longshots on mine too, but I have my pipes ceramic coated, inside and out. I left the heat shields chrome on the frontside and just coated the back side. My pipes are much cooler, which is nice at stop lights during this freakin' heat wave we've been having here lately.

As far as bluing, that is usually a sign of overheating most commonly due to tuneing issues. My ceramic coating shop has coated several brand new chrome MC pipes with an interior thermal barrier coating called "Hot Stop". It is real slick and is a great anti-corrosion coating. Hot Stop helps to prevent discoloration of the chrome on the outside. I'm sure pipes last a lot longer too without rust eating it from the inside.

I'm starting to sound like a salesman here, but ceramic coatings reportedly slightly increase hp by improved exhaust gas velocity. Yep, it seems that when you keep the superheated gases inside of the pipes (versus emitting through them), exhaust "scavenging" is effected which increases the efficiency of the exhaust cycle.

Glad to hear the powder scrubbing stuff works. I had wondered about that.