oneill@lll-crg.ARPA (Neil J. O'Neill) (12/13/84)
Just happened to have the Oct. 84 issue of Hot Rod Magazine handy. The cover story is called "Can they outlaw hot rodding?" and is full of information on the legalities of engine swaps and modifications. As far as engine swaps go, Hot Rod says the following: In cases of engine swaps, the BAR (Bureau of Automotive Repair) has ruled that motors installed before March 1984 must retain all smog equipment that came on the MOTOR; those swapped after March '84 must be fitted with all controls that came on the CAR. You need a reciept or other proof of the date of the swap ... [This is for Calif.] It is not clear to me exactly what "on the car" and "on the motor" mean. My truck has a control system that runs gas tank vapors into the carb, this seems to be both on the car and on the motor. As far as engine modifications go, everything is illegal until proven legal by the State Air Resources Board. That Weber carb and those Hooker headers you were about to slap onto your vehicle's engine must be state approved for the modification to be legal. It costs a manufacturer quite a lot of money to prove that its bolt-on-horsepower-booster doesn't pollute, so approved after-market parts are probably going to be few and expensive. A couple of very interesting loopholes to the law exist. If you power your car on methanol or propane then you can rip out all the pollution control junk and say goodbye to vehicle emissions inspections, as cars run on these fuels are exempt. Does anybody know what propane sells for these days? Just think how long your engine would last if you used propane and synthetic oil.