What's new
CK5
Register an account today to become a member! Once signed in, you'll be able to participate on this site by adding your own topics and posts, as well as connect with other members.

California Smog issues

retroblazer said:
Hey Joe,
Let's get one thing straight. I have the utmost respect for those that serve our country, particularly for those who enlisted.
Not to get personal, but given your view of our environment, it appears to be at odds with a vintage truck hobby. I'm sure I speak for more than myself, especially those of us that live in California, that having your insights are very helpful. We probably agree on far more things than we don't. I can also appreciate that you are like a police officer, and follow the letter of the law. It's black and white. It's the law.8
For most of us, we have to navigate the law. My Suburban has headers that were dyno smog tested in Illinois, yet because they don't have a CARB tag, they are illegal. Same with my hiflow cat. exact same part, but no CARB tag. Can you imagine if every state did the same thing?

Most of us have a hot rodder mentality. I'm a chronic speeder, but a considerate driver. It's only by divine intervention that I don't have a mass of speeding tickets. It also means that if I can retrofit fuel injection in place of a 30 year old, worn out carb, and improve emissions and performance, that I will do my best to slide it under the noses of the inspectors. We both want clean air.
Click to expand...

I know from where you're speaking... hotrodding-wise anyway.

It's kinda like finding a 100 dollar bill on the street and putting an ad in the newspaper Lost And Found Section. Everybody will respond as they want something for nothing, and even if you don't get to keep it, no blood or extremities were lost in the process.

You feel good about doing the right thing, but you know deep down in your heart that you've also now found 99 liars who answered your ad.

There are people who don't even have a dog in the fight, and yet they vociferously can't understand the WHY laws are written.

Take the "Wipers On - Headlights Also On" law in California.

It's intelligent yet many people choose to fight the law by not complying. But it's a good law and very logical at the same time since if you need wipers to see, at least make it easier for YOU to be seen in your vehicle.

Ya know.... we keep on bandying about California when other nanny states like Massachusetts and Connecticut and even Colorado have in some instances and locales, stronger worded and stronger enforced vehicle emissions laws.

I remember in New Jersey that any exhaust pipe the inspector could shove a 36 inch rod into, was a safety failure. This was 1959 or so. Things may have gotten stricter but I'm not sure.

It's not just California ya see? Take all the people out of the state who shouldn't be there and paint over the graffiti and eliminate the smog ... and California was a beautiful place to live. And don't forget to run the trash trucks 24/7 to clean the streets, lakes and rivers and the sides of the freeways and harbors..

I also suggest walling off... oh, maybe the whole of LA and make it a prison colony like in "Escape From New York".

Uh oh... that was an old fart's view, and I'll deny we ever had this conversation.

Here comes an old fart-ism....

I blame it all on the Internet.
And cellphones.
And Sacramento.
Maybe add 8mm home movies in there too.
 
kgblazerfive said:
NJ has no emissions on anything pre obd11 or safety inspections any more.
Click to expand...

That's both nice and bad at the same time, but I understand their logic.

The stick-up-the-tailpipe was goofy-stoooopid anyway even to me before puberty.

Cars typically return to their base metals after a full winter's dose of NJ road salt, so there's not much possibility of an older clunker still running. Not enough of them left anyway.

I've got a nephew running a body shop in Paramus and his single most important tool is a smoke wrench (oxy-acetylene torches).

He visited me in SoCal one year and stood jaw-dropped at the 1940-1970s cars running all over Beach Boulevard and PCH.

He asked me: "Are those fiberglass replicars?"
 
There are so many worthless and pointless government created and provided jobs in California, it's ridiculous. 90% of them need to be eliminated and the people employed by those jobs, sent out to find employment that actually matters. A smog referee is one of those jobs. The answer to cleaner air is not chasing down a couple of classic cars with government employees, or even forcing industry to convert aging (nearly retired) equipment with DPF systems. The answer is in design innovation towards the future, from the private sector. (Insert GM, John Deere, Cummins, etc.)
 
rjfguitar...........

"Well, there you go..."
......................to re-coin an old politician, Ronald Reagan who was governor (of LaLa Land after the corrupt and smog-ignorant leadership of Pat - "Father Of Moonbeam" - Brown) when I became the referee and was the only one in the area for a few years.

So much for a lot of nipplesuckers on the California Cow at that time. It has however since fallen into devious appointments of inlaws and outlaws and other nee'r-do-wells all over again.

But you are wrong if you see the Referee as punitive. My job was to get you and your car through the steps necessary to make it whole again. I had to work with ignorant people who only saw me as a jailer or Inquisitor who made you spend a lot of money on something that you had already screwed up so badly that someone had to bring a sense of order and provide a bright light at the end of the bureaucratic tunnel.

Remember - I was the intermediary between you and the law to try to get your vehicle to pass as best I could.

  • I researched and provided sources for parts that were obsolete, found them in junkyards where I spent many hours scouring them for the parts you needed.
  • I found these obscure parts in yard sales and estate sales where often I had to pay for them out of my own pocket and with all the hoops and paperwork for reimbursement that I most often just let it go.

Yeah though - the Retrofit NOx Devices were a shill - brought about by the final dregs of the Brown years though. They were eventually weeded out and retired to cause very little harm any more.

But with Rerun Moonbeam on the bully pulpit of things in Sanctuary-Land (California), things have gone from fairly good to horrible, and you're paying for it.

It was time for me to abandon ship and find the last great place.

I'm only here to help. I will pass on my experiences and the rules as I saw and obeyed them.

Remember that laws are good - it gives you a chance to know where you stand - on the criminal side or complying and causing no harm at least.
 
Joe In Montana said:
rjfguitar...........



But you are wrong if you see the Referee as punitive. My job was to get you and your car through the steps necessary to make it whole again. I had to work with ignorant people who only saw me as a jailer or Inquisitor who made you spend a lot of money on something that you had already screwed up so badly that someone had to bring a sense of order and provide a bright light at the end of the bureaucratic tunnel.

Remember - I was the intermediary between you and the law to try to get your vehicle to pass as best I could.

  • I researched and provided sources for parts that were obsolete, found them in junkyards where I spent many hours scouring them for the parts you needed.
  • I found these obscure parts in yard sales and estate sales where often I had to pay for them out of my own pocket and with all the hoops and paperwork for reimbursement that I most often just let it go.
Click to expand...
So my taxes were used to send you out looking for parts for people's vehicles? I am more confident in saying my tax money was wasted. We don't need government hand holders for stupid people. Emissions regulations should be simple. If you have, say.. a 1985 K5 with a 350/700R4. The emissions for that vehicle were set when it was new and should be all that matters. No visual needed, just a tail pipe test. If it's above that spec, it fails, if below passes REGARDLESS of what is under the hood. If someone is stupid and fails that set smog spec for that vehicle because they have shit F'd under the hood, that is THEIR problem and I don't support my money being wasted holding their hand. Sorry.
Yeah though - the Retrofit NOx Devices were a shill - brought about by the final dregs of the Brown years though. They were eventually weeded out and retired to cause very little harm any more.
Click to expand...
I don't know what you are talking about. I am talking about diesel particulate filter retrofit systems that CARB has gone on a crusade enforcing upon poor truckers barely getting by with an older truck that is now required to have an emissions system that costs twice what the truck is worth. A truck that was probably only 5 years from retirement anyway. I know multiple guys that were ruined financially by this. But, the wacko greenie nuts that only care about their crusade could care less about people's livelihoods.

Remember that laws are good - it gives you a chance to know where you stand - on the criminal side or complying and causing no harm at least.
Click to expand...
sheeple...
 
Joe In Montana said:
So - my career is what you hate or just me?

You're pathetic.
Click to expand...
I don't hate you, and if there is anything that could be classified as "pathetic," it would be your "career" choice. But, I don't blame you, most government jobs are easy for the pay and a lot of people like that sort of thing.

Obviously you took what I said very personal. Take it however you want, I don't really care. The TRUTH is what goes on here in California is a cluster F when it comes to government and we WASTE money on stupid programs, permit departments, and many more branches that need not even exist. It's why the other, about 47 normal states, hate us Californians. Your job and our complex smog system/laws are a perfect example of that.

I will admit, I didn't like you as soon as I read your complaints about how the air "hurt" you and that you had to run off to Montana. That is a huge sore spot with me. Far too many Californians that sound just like "that" are screwing up good states like Nevada, Texas, Idaho, and Montana.
 
rjfguitar said:
I don't hate you, and if there is anything that could be classified as "pathetic," it would be your "career" choice. But, I don't blame you, most government jobs are easy for the pay and a lot of people like that sort of thing.

Obviously you took what I said very personal. Take it however you want, I don't really care. The TRUTH is what goes on here in California is a cluster F when it comes to government and we WASTE money on stupid programs, permit departments, and many more branches that need not even exist. It's why the other, about 47 normal states, hate us Californians. Your job and our complex smog system/laws are a perfect example of that.

I will admit, I didn't like you as soon as I read your complaints about how the air "hurt" you and that you had to run off to Montana. That is a huge sore spot with me. Far too many Californians that sound just like "that" are screwing up good states like Nevada, Texas, Idaho, and Montana.
Click to expand...


When someone - who has no idea what I did with my life - tries to analyze me and find me a giant suck hole in the taxpayer's pocket - yeah, I get insulted.

FYI: I owned and operated three automotive shops at one time.

One in Santa Ana on Dyer Road where we did general automotive and heavy duty diesel and construction equipment - specializing in Bobcats by Melroe.

Another was a chopper shop in Costa Mesa where I built and modified HD bikes for most of the biker gangs in Orange County - on different days, of course. I was a Grey Bang distributor.

Another shop was in Fullerton - a transmission shop that I owned and sometimes worked at, but generally let my best friend run it as he saw fit.

Then I got my Unlimited Horsepower Steam Engineer's License and as a Biomedical Engineer where I worked in a major LA Hospital.

Another place that I co-owned was a concrete and asphalt demo company in Riverside County where I took care of all the gear, pumps, hydraulics and fabrication including body and painting work on customized extensions for the front of F-450 trucks to accommodate the crankshaft driven pumps.

I also ran all the field work, repaired all the broken machines in the evenings and oversaw the safety and welfare - of most times - an eleven man crew cutting - busting and hauling concrete during the days where it was 120F in the shade - and there was no shade.

Oh yeah - I also tested for and passed my Pyrotechnician's Certification License so I could blow things up legally.

I also played bass guitar in several CW venues - one in 29 Palms, one in Palm Springs, others in Orange, LA and San Berdoo counties.

I was a fleet mechanic for Laura Scudders in Fullerton where I'd R&R brakes, gas engines, tow motors, transmissions, in frame overhauled 350 Detroits, fixed Liquefied Propane systems and got my Air Brake cert and a Class A CDL along the way.

I also found time for six years in the Navy as a Shipfitter (ne: Hull Tech), got my NASA Pressure Hull Cert for welding and picked up a Federal License in Cryogenic Gasses manufacturing and handling, building LMP and GMD pumping stations for LOX and NOX..

Yeah - I guess I was a pretty selfish person, relying on State Welfare employment and taking money out of your pocket by forcing you to comply with the laws that were passed by your duly elected representatives in Sacramento.

You made California what it is, and I'm now retired from all that - California especially -- and I moved here retired to not be taking a job from someone who lives here and needs to work.

Like I said: I'm retired now - and every day is Saturday except Sunday and Thursday.

I go fishing and canoeing and fishing and take driving tours of Montana and Idaho and ----I don't know if I mentioned I go fishing a lot --- so like Bart Simpson says: "Eat my shrºts".


.
 
Joe In Montana said:
When someone - who has no idea what I did with my life - tries to analyze me and find me a giant suck hole in the taxpayer's pocket - yeah, I get insulted.

FYI: I owned and operated three automotive shops at one time.

One in Santa Ana on Dyer Road where we did general automotive and heavy duty diesel and construction equipment - specializing in Bobcats by Melroe.

Another was a chopper shop in Costa Mesa where I built and modified HD bikes for most of the biker gangs in Orange County - on different days, of course. I was a Grey Bang distributor.

Another shop was in Fullerton - a transmission shop that I owned and sometimes worked at, but generally let my best friend run it as he saw fit.

Then I got my Unlimited Horsepower Steam Engineer's License and as a Biomedical Engineer where I worked in a major LA Hospital.

Another place that I co-owned was a concrete and asphalt demo company in Riverside County where I took care of all the gear, pumps, hydraulics and fabrication including body and painting work on customized extensions for the front of F-450 trucks to accommodate the crankshaft driven pumps.

I also ran all the field work, repaired all the broken machines in the evenings and oversaw the safety and welfare - of most times - an eleven man crew cutting - busting and hauling concrete during the days where it was 120F in the shade - and there was no shade.

Oh yeah - I also tested for and passed my Pyrotechnician's Certification License so I could blow things up legally.

I also played bass guitar in several CW venues - one in 29 Palms, one in Palm Springs, others in Orange, LA and San Berdoo counties.

I was a fleet mechanic for Laura Scudders in Fullerton where I'd R&R brakes, gas engines, tow motors, transmissions, in frame overhauled 350 Detroits, fixed Liquefied Propane systems and got my Air Brake cert and a Class A CDL along the way.

I also found time for six years in the Navy as a Shipfitter (ne: Hull Tech), got my NASA Pressure Hull Cert for welding and picked up a Federal License in Cryogenic Gasses manufacturing and handling, building LMP and GMD pumping stations for LOX and NOX..

Yeah - I guess I was a pretty selfish person, relying on State Welfare employment and taking money out of your pocket by forcing you to comply with the laws that were passed by your duly elected representatives in Sacramento.

You made California what it is, and I'm now retired from all that - California especially -- and I moved here retired to not be taking a job from someone who lives here and needs to work.

Like I said: I'm retired now - and every day is Saturday except Sunday and Thursday.

I go fishing and canoeing and fishing and take driving tours of Montana and Idaho and ----I don't know if I mentioned I go fishing a lot --- so like Bart Simpson says: "Eat my shrºts".


.
Click to expand...
So you're saying you got a real job?
 
You must log in or register to reply here.

Latest Posts

Top Bottom