kyle robert moore

aloha,

my shiny red 911 is making its trip across the pacific to our new home here in san diego. it has current hawaii license plates and aftermarket exhaust. i do have the original sc exhaust and cat for the smog test.

first can anyone reccomend a smog guy that has poor eyesight?

any hints on passing smog?

my hawaii registration runs out in feb 06 so i have some time.

thanks in advance,
kyle

Brett San Diego

You don't really have time (at least not legally). According to the DMV rules, you have 1 month after you move here to register your car in CA. Now you could always try to tell the DMV office personnel that you just got here. I don't recall how they check up on you. It was 4 years ago that I moved to San Diego.

Read about everything on the DMV web site: www.dmv.ca.gov

For smog checks, I've always gone to a shell station at I-5 and Carmel Valley Rd. About $70. Never had any problems, but I've never had an aftermarket exhaust.

Brett

Edward

Hi Kyle,

I've been down this road with my 82SC. First off, you will find many guys who claim that their SC will pass w/o a cat with "just a little tweaking" ...mine didn't even come close no matter what tweaking, and this with a knowledgable 911 mechanic with an exhaust anlyzer. My guess is those guys who passed did so with a 78-79 model with air pump and no O2 sensor ...our models with O2 have tighter CA air requirements than these earlier SCs.

So you are left with two choices:

1) Find a mechanic that will find such a smog center as you described (it will COST you!!)
2) Bolt up the OE system w/cat that you have. Take a good, hard look at studs before you turn a wrench, however, as these are known to break off on high-mileage cars (major PITA to fix), or those that have lived in corrosive environments (last I checked Hawaii is surrounded by, um, salt water). Oh, and depending what heat exchangers you have, you may or may not have to swap two oil lines (as you do with an SSI system). All in all, not fun. Welcome to California, land of the CARB-*****.

Edward

r911

I sure would NOT lie to them. It's probably illegal to do that.

You might ask them for some sort of waiver - even anonymously.

I also take exception to the '****' comment. Besides denigrating people who DID suffer from **** oppression, it overlooks the simple fact that CARB is trying to make the air safe for people to breathe. People die from the dirty air. It's pretty damn simple.

M491

I think you are going to have to plan on putting the original equipment back on to get the car smogged.

It definately won't pass the visual. They know what an O2 sensor looks like, etc.

I doubt that it would pass the output test, either.

People talk about finding places that will "let you slide." I'm sure places like that exist. But there aren't many. It's not like the old days. Cal. smog places have a HUGE investment in the necessary smog equipment, and the fines are big for violations. They get randomly tested and audited by the state, and smog places tend to be pretty nervous, from what I've seen.

I know some guys that have done 3.6 conversions in California, for example, that have NEVER been able to get a smog certificate, despite trying everything.

Peter Zimmermann

M491 hit the nail on the head. The investment, the fines and JAIL TIME to write an illegal certification all make someone who might do it certifiable. Your car, as others said, will require the complete SC exhaust including a hooked up and functional O2 sensor. Hopefully you still have the original heat exchangers on the car, if so the changeover will be much easier - everything for the cat & muffler is held together with bolts, not studs, so it doesn't matter if a few pieces of hardware break. If you have the install done professionally you should request all new hardware anyway. When they're done have them set the mixture and verify that the car is clean out the tailpipe. If the CO & timing are set to factory spec the car will pass easily (run a tank of Chevron premium through it when the car gets to S.D., that will also help). If you drive the car with HI plates in CA look forward to getting pulled over soon after you get here - CA wants your MONEY!
Pete.

therotman

Whatever you do, do not go to the "test only" places-

From the CA DMV:

If you have gone "to a Test-Only station for your vehicle’s initial inspection, it must be retested and certified at a Test-Only station, or a Gold Shield station. Test-Only stations are prohibited by law from selling diagnosis or repairs."

Go to a place that can test and adjust your car to pass the test- It is much easier than getting tested one place, taking it to be repaired at another place, then driving it back to the test place to hope the problem has been corrected-

I learned this the hard way with a 88 Turbo RX7

- My 1st post!

LA964RS

I knew a guy who had his car in California over a year and a half w/out of state plates...and yes when they had been expired for a while he finally went and smoged it....no one said a word about how long the car had been in the state, etc. DMV doesn't know its left from its right!

When you hit SD...go to Dieter's for Black Forest or some other PCA/POC friendly place and ask their opinion. Good guys at both and should point you in the righ direction.

Also the closer you get to the boarder the better chance you have of getting a good smog report!...Not that I know from personal experiece or anything...National City is also a GOOD place to look for a smog guy.

Good luck.

recordmanv

I agree with Edward. SC is a PITA to smog-even with all the proper OEM equipment AND a new cat. With the age, I am sure the DMV will require a "Test Only". To get my SC to pass, I needed a new CAT, the car's air/fuel mixture needed to be tamed down to barely running, got the engine temp hot, and prayed to the smog gods...... Barely passes. I learned one thing form all this, a good tune-up can REALLY make a huge difference on how the SC performs. When I am tuned for smog pass, the car feels like it's lost 50 horses....a real dog. Good Luck!

Peter Zimmermann

I want to go on the record here. There is no "tune" and "smog tune" on an SC. There is "factory spec" and that is it. If an '80 - '83 won't pass smog (1) something is set wrong, (2) the cat is bad, (3) the plug wires are bad, or a related electrical gremlin, or (4) the 02 sensor is bad/disconnected. The CO% spec is 0.6% +/- 0.2% hot, pre-cat, 02 sensor disconnected. The technician will see immediately if there is an additional problem (a high HC level at correct CO) that the cause of must be diagnosed/repaired. Obviously a compression problem, super high oil consumption, bad/cheap gasoline can all enter into this discussion, but the chance of having one or more of those issues is already known before an attempt to pass smog is made. My '82 has 202,000 miles, original engine, and is tuned to factory spec (CO, timing, etc.). It is fitted with the original cat, I use only Chevron premium, and a recent smog test left the test station guys shaking their heads - the results were so clean that the requirement could have been twice as tough, and the car would have still passed - easily. We've seen the same thing on customer cars over and over again. If your SC won't pass a smog test you've got a mechanic that does not have your best interests at heart, or he's missed something. If you think that richening up the mixture after a smog test helps it to run better, think again. The camshafts are so mild in an SC it can't run better rich, it has to be at factory spec. If you think getting it leaner than spec will help it pass, think again. A lean mixture in an SC causes high combustion chamber temperature, which causes incomplete (dirty) combustion, actually reducing your chance for passing the test. We did extensive testing on our PCA Club Racer ('81 SC with SSIs and cam timing tweaks) and even that car sarted slowing down on the straightaway above 1.2% CO. Porsche did not goof when they stipulated the tune spec for CO, 0.6% works, for smog tests or DE days.
Pete