DKWalser

Cuda - I hope that nothing I've said would cause anyone to think I endorse California's approach! I don't. I was merely saying why I believe courts would be reluctant to say California's law is so unreasonable it should be overturned. In our system, legislatures have the latitude to pass good and bad laws. It's only when those laws (whether good or bad) impinge constitutionally protected freedoms that the courts that the courts are allowed to set aside the legislature's choice. It doesn't always work that way, but its the way it should work.

hacker-pschorr

Not really, there is a precedent to this thinking. Talk to anyone in the auto repair business, "aftermarket" CATS do not have the best reputation.

Good friend of mine that has owned / operated his own shop since the 70's got sick and tired of customers coming back a year later with the CEL on and a code of catalyst efficiency. Sure it was under warranty, as a shop owner he's eating the labor to do the job again.

He only installs non-OEM catalysts when nothing else is available. It just isn't worth the hassle.

He feels the same way about pretty much any car part. Brakes, tie rods, suspension pieces et..... It's rare to find something aftermarket that is the same quality as OEM.

Are there good aftermarket CATS on the market? Absolutely, there is also a lot of crap.


Here is a crazy idea..... why not pressure the manufacturers to offer their original cats for less than a kidney?

hacker-pschorr

Here you go, see what is going on in your state:

http://www.semasan.com/page.asp?cont...e_leg&g=semaga

Mongo

This one has me worried based on your link you sent.



All they have to do is declare your car a gross polluter at a smog station to try and take it.

Bill51sdr

And therein lies the problem most here have when it comes to smog failures. I used to do smog tests back when they first introduced dynos here. The A/M cats are at best a one-shot deal. I saw many that were brand new giving marginal-at best results. You see the same guy 2 years later and the car fails miserably. The biggest joke are the people that come to the test after having added "Guaranteed Pass in a Can" crap to their tank believing it to be a cure all for a crappily maintained engine. Generally speaking, at least in CA, if you can smell raw exhaust coming out of your tailpipe, don't bother wasting your time with the smog. OEM cats are the way to go, you get what you pay for folks.

Rob Edwards

The problem is that a new S4+ cat (928 113 219 04) is $2750. That buys about 8 pairs of 36304 cats, or 16 years' worth of smog if you changed them out right before every biennial testing.

Even if a new factory S4+ cat was a grand, I'd do that every 25 years for the sake of not having to worry about it. But $2800? Yikes.

Bill51sdr

It is expensive because they probably sell one or two per year, I imagine. People trying to find cheap alternatives does not help.

hacker-pschorr

They are probably not in production anymore, and will be NLA eventually.

Then what?

That is the crux of the matter.
If California is working towards eliminating all cars off the road older than 5-6 years, they are going in the right direction.

Unless your name is Jay Leno and most of your cars are registered out of state.
That McLaren F1 must spend a lot of time in Montana.



Maybe someone needs to ping up Fabspeed about recoring an original CAT:

http://www.ferrarichat.com/forum/348...-fabspeed.html

Mongo

You will soon see that even exhaust suppliers and tuners will refuse to 're-core' an OEM cat because of how this state behaves. Also, what are the chances of the re-core containing the same precious metals concentration as the factory original? Slim to none is my educated guess.

Cuda911

Ah, I guess missed that you were just stating what you believe the State's position to be. Our freedoms are eroded on a daily basis with the thousands of new laws that are passed each and every year.

Again, that's not the point at all. Sure, some aftermarket ones may be crap and fail. So, if the car is smogged and fails, pop the offender at that time. The State wants to make everyone criminals, before a crime has been committed "Your cat MAY prematurely fail (or not), so therefore you have committed a crime" is the "logic" the State uses.

Mongo

So, I just drove by the shop that failed me. They have a Boxster with both trunks open and two guys scratching their heads. I am guessing they are trying to inspect the air injection or EGR and don't know where the engine is.

hacker-pschorr

Logic? Silly, this is the Government

It's not "some" of the aftermarket cats having a shorter life than OEM, I'd put money on it being well over 90% will not last 1/4 as long (if that much) as the original unit. The vast majority of people do not hang on to cars long enough to care, so it's a moot point to the catalyst industry.

I still have the original CAT on my Saab with 170,000 miles on it, original one on my fathers Yukon with 225,000 miles, 2000 VW with over 200k........
These are winter vehicles getting covered in salt 6 months out of the year.
When the average life of an aftermarket unit is 1-2 years..... you can see where California is coming from on this.

This gets me wondering why the aftermarket units are so dirt cheap. My guess is they contain much less platinum than OEM units, with platinum going for $1,400 an ounce, that could be the easiest way to cut the cost and I'm guessing efficiency and life of a catalytic converter.
If this is true and the amount of platinum is one of the formula's for a "passing" CAT in California, not much of a mystery behind it.

Bottom line it's a money issue over everything else. California gets money for certifying parts and they do it because they can. All in the name of "being green".

I'm simply pointing out where I'm sure the thinking is coming from with this particular part of the law.


There is also talk of much more efficient catalytic converters coming out that does not use any (or very little) platinum and will be much cheaper to manufacture. Here is hoping such a unit will be passable on a 928.

The Forgotten On

danglerb

All you need to do is have a car with any number of basic fuel and emission things malfunctioning to get tagged as a gross polluter. All I have seen happen as a result is that next inspection you need to go to a special, ala STAR inspection.

Aftermarket is almost never OEM quality, but with cats failing we are talking about 30 year old cars that may have many fuel issues that kill cats.

dr bob

FWIW, my car has been getting test-only and now STAR-only notices for years. It's never failed a test. No worries except the little extra cost. I have a good tester, a former 928 owner, who appreciates the car. He usually just asks if anything's changed since last time. This last test, in August, was with a new tech at his shop. I had to steer the tech through the locations of components and how to read the sticker under the hood to find the pieces. He was having trouible getting a grasp of how the diagram relates to the car; Seems the car was facing the wrong direction per the diagram. Anyway, it all worked out, and he never looked underneath for cats. There's a pretty broad spectrum of talent and knowledge at smog-check places. When I found a guy that knew the car OK, he got my business from then on. I bring donuts and coffee, we shoot the breeze, and he remeberes me two years later like an old friend. Moral: find a place that knows the cars and is sympathetic if you can. Don't crank them on costs. Bring refreshments if appropriate. Be nice about it all.


I want to tell you about another place, where they wanted to put the rear wheels of my Subaru wagon ski car on the rollers. Because the "fronts always spray grease on the rollers". I told him it's front wheel drive. He said "it's four wheel drive, and I'd rather use the rears." Took more than a couple minutes of gentle discussion before it finally came to him that the car would drive off the rollers in four wheel drive with the rears on them. I can help ignorance. Stubborn and stupid is a bigger challenge sometimes.