Help needed passing Emissions!
that was the 1st yr for 318s, came in 89 with 360s.
Where I live it aint an issue..... the next county north it is. (I grew up there) My brother bought an 80 Ramcharger, factory 360-4 bbl truck.... and I remember the fight we had yearly with the smog nazi's.... we discovered the truck had had the orig 360 replaced with a '73 360 somewhere along the line...
the guy he got it from, had a Hi po distributor in it (Mallory I think) that was NOT going with the truck unless my brother would pay him more than you could get those from, at Super Shops for (remember that place?) over asking price. so the seller replaced the dist with a POINTS one... WTF.. in 80 everything was elec ignition....
and it had a Holley #1850 carb (I HATED those for reasons that had NOTHING to do with smog laws, just not a Holley carb fan) and it was thru the roof....
it had hewaders and duals on it, with "dummy" blank cats on it.... but they looked the part....
I put a TQ back onto it, and whatever SB electronic dist I could find in the old man's garage and tuned it to run the best that engine could run, ran the carb to the highest reading on the vac gauge I possibly could, and it passed....... the next year I had to (according to the smog station) take it to a DEALER and have them make up a work order with their shop name on it, that verified the numbers on the engine indicated a '73 engine transplant and then it passed REAL good, they went by 73 standards. I went in there with pix and a '73 factory service manual, and tried to show them where the numbers that IDd the engines was on that engine, and before I could open that 73 FSM to the "engine ID page I got thrown outta the smog station and told the ONLY way it would pass was to either find a stock, 80 or newer engine with all the exact pollution BS on it as that engine came from Chrysler with in its original chassis OR to go to a dealer (HAD to be a dealer, not an independent) pay that dealer whatever ransom they required to inspect the truck, list the existing engine numbers on a work order/ along with what that engine ID'd as.... and THEN come back.
we got it passed finally..... this was in Chicago's south suburbs. Last I knew, they had closed down all the emissions stations for "remodels" then once opened back up, then only '96 and up vehicles were subject to testing. But now there are independent shops scattered about the test req'd area that you have to go to, instead of state run ones but you still have to have a "PASS" in the smog check system, in order to be able to renew plates which is a crock of $#!t. Go to the DMV in req'd areas without them being able to see it as "PASS in their computer, they wont even print out the registration that comes with your sticker.....
