So, smog time finally arrived, the day that I have dreaded for the last year... I recently sold the fd to a friend of mine, but we had to get it smogged for reg.
The fd has a:
*reman. engine that is about a year old,
*hks rs intake,
*hks exhaust,
*and downpipe,
*still has the cat. and air pump,
*and lastly an apex'i pfc...
When we get to the place (in pittsburg, off of parkside dr.) the guy is already grillin' us about the intake not being stock and how the CEL doesn't come on when u turn the key (ofcourse it won't come on as the egr wire was cut) after the pre-test was done(thank god we didn't do the real one) it turns out the car is classes as a GROSS POLUTER... on every test the results were TRIPLE the max allowed levels, something to be proud of I'm sure if he wasn't planning on having this car as a daily driver... we figured it may be attributed to the default pfc settings which have the fuel set a wee-bit rich... now the questions, is there anything that can be done, tuning-wise, to clean it up a bit, though it would take a hell of a lot of tuning since the results were so bad... should we put the stock ecu back in? Or, does anyone in norcal know any smog-only places that are a little bit *cough* lenient on their testing for say a little bit more paid up front? please, any advice would be much appreciated...

 

As long as you control boost, you should be able to use a stock ECU with those modifications. It will happily flash the CEL light.

I don't think you should be polluting as much as you are though - I've heard of people passing the sniffer test with those modifications and a PFC in California. Have you tried new plugs and wires?

 

I just passed fairly easily, although I had to convince the tester to run the 25mph test in 3rd gear -- the PFC shuts the air pump off at 2500 rpm instead of 3200 rpm like the stock ecu.

I just passed with (relevant mods) RX7Fashion intake, PFS SMIC, downpipe, hi-flow cat, fresh rebuilt streetported motor with less than 300 miles on it, and the PFC with a rich, safe map for engine break-in. The CEL light is rigged to come on at start-up, hehe.

If you grossly failed, there is plain and simple something wrong with the car, the PFC or those mods are not to blame.

Rick's Rotary in Pleasanton is a great place to take your FD, in general, and Rick does a lot of smog-passing work on RX-7s and other cars. He's very busy these days but I would give him a call and get the car in there for a check-up.

What were the test results?

 

yea, rick is great, he actually installed my motor... now the 3rd gear 25mph test is something I didn't think of... as for plugs and wires, all new stuff, so no worries there...

 

Our stock '94 (bought new) failed its first smog test in '96 as a gross polluter. Turned out there were a couple of crossed vacuum hoses, and a pinched wire under the UIM. This was from the factory! make sure the air pump vacuum control line is not being pinched shut by the lower surface of the UIM. Beyond that, maybe you need a new cat converter. We did, in 2002.

 

I think this belongs in the westside section. PMed you.

 

FD2Envy, was this smog place ythe one before you turn to Costco. Also I was wondering do you drive a black FD.

 

yea, I think this should be looked into, thanx for the info about the vacuum lines...
yea, I think it's on the way towards costco if you continue on west 10th, Smog Venture is the place... nah, the FD is red...