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She's a gross polluter!

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tweety

tweety

Jedi Trainee
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Went through the smog test today..... Sure enough, she's a gross polluter. Big shocker there with a Zenith Carb.

Not sure what I'll do now, but at least now that she's certified by a California "TEST ONLY STATION" as a gross polluter I can take her to her normal mechanic who can tinker with her while on the dyno. If he can get her to pass then I'm set!

If not, I'll have to start the "repair" process and try to get it exempted.

I guess this is what I get for buying a 1979! I'll have to do this every two years as long as I own her.
 
Don't blame it on the ZS carb or that its a '79....my '79 passed emmissions everytime I had to do so while in the Army....it can be made to pass by a good mechanic.
 
Actually, I blamed the Zenith carb because it's easy to blame this carb. I fault myself for the 79 thing because it will never be exempt from testing as the somg exempt date is now locked at 1975.

The good news is that I watched exactly what the inspector looked for. I'm fairly comfortable that I can change the carb to whatever I want and as long as it does not spit too much gunk out the tailpipe I will pass.

Off to see the "good mechanic" on Monday.
 
Luke_Healey said:
would a colortune tool help you quickly remedy this? You could tune for a balanced mixture to clean things up.. or even run lean on purpose?
Click to expand...

I had not even thought of that. It's brilliant.

My biggest issue is that I have to get it to pass by the end of July. Either that or I have to sweet talk someone at the DMV to give me one more one month extension.
 
Or what, they crush it. I don't think so.

Borrow an engine that is ok. Hehe, maybe you CA folks can have one you pass around.
 
It seems to me that with a little mixture and timing tweaking, you should be able to get it to pass, if it ever passed. I'm assuming you don't have a major problem like badly worn piston rings or valve guides, or such. Then, once you have the certificate, you can return it to some kind of tuning that really runs.

I don't mean to be flippant about air pollution--I recognize it's important. But, gee, getting one of these puppies to meet any kind of reasonable tailpipe emission spec is like trying to float a brick. Either you let them on the road, and tolerate what they emit, or get them off the road. Pretending that there's a middle ground is just silly.

'Course, the AQMD doesn't consult with me. And probably would ignore my advice if they did.
 
If it failed 'rich'... have you checked the auto choke? They fail "on", you'll need to remedy that first before you can tune the carb.

Lots of info & links in previous threads...
 
I recall that someone was talking about the test a while back (tried to find the thread but couldn't) If I remember correctly we were advised to run shell ultra on the highway for 1/2 an hour before the test and bring the car directly to the shop. does anyone else remember this?
 
I usually throw a half tank of Amoco...oops I mean BP high test in the tank of all my vehicles and drive around for 30-40 minutes before heading to the test station.
 
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