Very nice write up. I haven't gotten my car inspected yet, but we'll see if I pass first...

Great post. I was actually thinking of trying something along the same lines. I have spent plenty of money to qualify for a waiver for this year, but I don't want this to become an annual ritual. When purchased, the car had what looks to be a fairly new high-flow on it, but CO and HC were way high.
I have already bought a set of stock cats to deal with the issue for the long term, but I may have more work ahead anyway. I tested my split air solenoid per the FSM and either it or my testing protocol is bad. I may try a test with the air rig as a diagnostic just for the hell of it. If the problem is really no air to the cat it should pass with the air rig. Then I will now what to fix for next time. (and I really like the silencer/hi-flow set-up that is on there now - why be in such a rush to pull it off -eh?)

BTW - None of the emissions places I've been to have any clue what the rotary set-up is supposed to look like anyway.

i think im gonna be doing some de-emmisionning tonite! MUAH HA HA

any cali people want to try this on the dyno smog test?

Because bribery is less ethical that using a mickey-ficked emissions system for 1 hour and then taking it off again? :confused:

You got me as in "GOTTCHA".

It's not mickey-ficked though. It's a one hundred percent working emissions system. As described in the manual i.e. airpump, acv, catalytic converter in stock form. As in not asking someone else to be a crook.

i tried this when i needed to get smogged last year and still failed...then again, my motor is ported, so i wasn't too surprised that it didn't work. I eventually passed using an s-afc to lean it way out.

john

blah enough with ethics in this thread...

Yes, that's not the point of this thread, so lets just end the ethics debate.

Excellant artical. My 7 is still scattered all over my garage but this answers my ???'s about desmoging and emissions. Thanks!

Noooooo problem :)

Like I said, a lot of people that talk to me on AIM that are on rx7club were having problems and I kept having to repeat myself, so I just made this thread.

I just payed a guy 50 bucks, and he put a Ford Focus on the dyno for me. Ethics Smethics :)

Like I said, my pass only cost me about $5, maybe $10 :)

Lol, yeah, it would have cost me alot more, my cat was clogged, so I put a TF DP on it :)

Ah alright then, that definitely would've cost more.

I remember reading that the 3rd gen forum had done a test on cats with dynos and concluded that the bonez high-flow cat had performance gains equivalent to that of a straight pipe.

How is passing the test by cheating any more ethical then paying for a sticker?

How is something less illegal, its either illegal or its not. Don't know about where you live but where im from cops dont hang out in repair stations to see if you are paying someone off. Plus the station would get in trouble not you.

Edit:

Oh ya there has to be a "shady" shop someplace near you. There is always a "shady" anything where there is money to be made.

I thought I said we were done with the ethical/cheating/etc. talk? That's really not what this thread is about.

yes, agreed. this type of talk should not even be in the 2nd gen forum, which is a technical forum. having said that, we should not be talking about paying to "buy" an emissions test.

dDub, is there any danger in leaning out too much that your NO (i think it's NO) emissions fail? i have an SAFCII that i can lean out for an e-missions test, do i just lean out as much as possible for an e-test?

also, i was wondering if anyone has thought of putting on a different sized pulley on the airpump to over drive it. this would help especially for idle tests...

as for the high flow cat, i think that it is very beneficial on a turbo charged rotary, but on a normally aspirated car, i think a straight pipe would still provide a larger power gain...but that is just my opinion.

For leaning out, this is what I'd do. Before messing around with anything, get the car/emissions equipment/idle/etc. set up the way you're going to run it for the test, if you need to change anything that is, then work on leaning it out. Start with the idle mixture. Keep leaning it out slowly until the car starts to chug and want to die from lack of fuel, then richen it up a bit to get a semi-smoother idle. Take it for a quick spin around the neighborhood or something to make sure it doesn't die on decel when coming to a stop. This is mostly dependent on if you have an idle test, though.

Then I'd concentrate on the 1-3k rpm range. Start by just subtracting a little fuel, take it for a drive and see how it drives like that. If it's ok, take out a little more, and keep testing it. With an n/a rx7 lack of fuel will just make it fall on its face from loss of power. You want to be able to have it drive smoothly while it's leaned out.

As for what happens to the NOx, I'll check my test when I get home (at college right now). My state doesn't require any limit on NOx but I believe you're right that as you lean it out more and more the NOx will go up. I'll look at my emissions sheet and see what I got for my test.

Ok just checked my emissions sheet and I have no NOx on it. Only other thing I have besides CO% and HC's is O2% and CO%+CO2%

So I don't know what to tell you for the NOx other than try it and find out :p:

No visual? If an S5 with the orignal zillion mile cat is failing with high HC, it can pass by retarding the timing. That's one of the oldest tricks out there. It will increase NOx, but S5's usually have a ton of leeway as far as NOx. I don't know about NOx and S4's, but it's worth a try.

For those wondering about catalytic converters, Rotary News has an article about Rx-7's and high flow converters in the archive.

Also, MazdaSport ran a similar article.

Just trying to offer the most sound advice. Good luck with putting all that stress on a 15+ year old engine.

If the engine can't handle lowering the idle and leaning it out a little (remember this is an N/A I'm talking about) then it has more things wrong with it. I'm not talking about leaning it out to 14 or 15:1 AFR's or something, I dunno if it'd even work doing that, I'm just talking about IF you have a fuel controller and you want to lean it out for the test, just play with it a little and be safe.

[QUOTE=TKE]How is passing the test by cheating any more ethical then paying for a sticker?



I hope you are not asserting that I cheat to pass the emissions test. I don't.

There's only four items that need to work right to pass. The two solenoids, switching and relief are bullet proof, the acv only has to have its diaphrams intact, the airpump is almost bullet proof, and a catalytic converter really does not cost that much if it's aftermarket. There's a free, online fsm for checking out the items above.

EDIT: And my afr was in the 12.9 range when I last passed (afr read with the airpump disabled, test done with the airpump intact).

^^^ what is the link to that FSM?