[JimP]

I know that a lot of us are having a few problems with the heat off of the exhaust heating up the rear fender above the muffler. I picked up some reflective tape from Amazon and placed it onto the fender area above the muffler where a passenger would place their left leg.

https://www.amazon.com/gp/product/B00029KC2K/ref=oh_aui_detailpage_o05_s00?ie=UTF8&psc=1

Today I took a ride and check the temperature of the outside of the fender and was quite surprised. The highest temperature that I came up with was 90 degrees with the temperature on the other side above the muffler at 214. My last measurement after a 15 minute ride at around 20 mph was 71 degrees on the outside and 196 directly under the same spot.

So I think that the tape will help quite a bit in keeping things cooler. As I was riding today I would place a hand onto the fender and at no time did I notice more heat than I could stand. I am going to order up some more of the tape and as I pull plastics off I'll place more of the tape onto it for rider comfort.

Here are a couple of pictures of it installed.

 

[Primethious]

Thanks for the great tip!
I ordered two rolls.
Everything I place in the glove box gets cooked.

My cell phone goes into protection mode.
Might help there too.

 

[Nomad]

I can honestly say, I've notice quite a heat reduction since switching my Kodiak to synthetic oil.

 

[JimP]

I just ordered up some more tape for when I start pulling plastics off so that I can do the area around the glove box and plastic cover on the left side where my leg sits.

I took another ride on it yesterday and rode quite a bit with my gloves off and would constantly feel the left side fender to see how it felt. I think I found a good fix to this heat problem, I'll know for sure next month when I have a passenger for a while.

 

[Primethious]

I can honestly say, I've notice quite a heat reduction since switching my Kodiak to synthetic oil.

Never would have thought oil would make that kind of difference.
What kind and weight did you go with?

 

[Nomad]

Never would have thought oil would make that kind of difference.
What kind and weight did you go with?

Shell Rotella T6 5w40.

 

[Primethious]

Great stuff as it has fiberglass weave under the shiny cover


I ran out of tape pretty quickly so I ordered a few more rolls.


Two rolls was good enough to do the left side just above the muffler, part of the left foot well wall, and under the seat itself.
Still got to finish the left foot well wall, do the right foot well wall, under the glove box, behind the side panels, and maybe under the glove box housing.

 

[JimP]

Ya, that tape can disappear very quickly when you start applying it.

I just wonder what the temperatures will be once it is on all of the plastics where heat is a problem on the underside of the plastic. That is something that might need to be looked at and perhaps we might need to come up with a solution for better air movement over these engine parts. The cooling system should be able to handle the little extra heat but needs to be watched. I have it a little bit better than most in that I have a actual coolant gauge on my aftermarket gauges that I can watch to see what is happening but it still shouldn't get over 206 degrees which is the max that I have seen so far.