I don't recommend removing any emissions equipment and i can tell you for a fact that my 90 gets better mileage and performance with the EGR on it and working. I am getting around 330 miles per tank mixed driving.
That was not the case before I switched to Ford injectors. On the stock OEM replacement injectors(new) I was only getting 275 miles per tank full. The Ford injectors seem to lean the RENIX out some and eliminates some of the carbon build up in the intake from the exhaust recirculation.
I'm no tree hugger by any means but I feel that its important to be compliant when it comes to emissions equipment.
Interesting. Shortly after I'd gotten my 87 'way back when, the EGR had kacked out on me. It ran cleaner and better
without that wretched thing than with - go figure. I think I lost something like 1-2mpg when I'd replaced it as well (mixed driving.)
NOx was low enough to not be a problem, HC and CO were pretty well zero when the EGR was
kaput. I fixed it, and NOx dropped negligibly - but HC and CO went through the roof! The "tech" told me I'd be looking at a new cat soon - so I just unplugged the EGR instead (I'm sorry - but when I've got a report on State-approved equipment saying it runs cleaner without the thing, I think it's time to re-evaluate the whole setup...)
Let me delete the EGR and replace its function with water/MeOH fogging, and I can get the whole engine to run cleaner and more efficiently. The water/MeOH mix will bring combustion temperatures down (reducing NOx,) the MeOH works like a "primer" to encourage combustion (reducing HC and CO,) and the elimination of the EGR keeps the intake system from getting crapped up with carbon (reducing component failure and periodic cleaning and readjustment.)
Proper tuning of spark timing and the water/MeOH delivery can reduce (or eliminate outright) the need for the catalytic converter -
while providing a net positive effect on the reduction of harmful tailpipe emissions!
I'm not looking to get rid of "Emissions Control Devices" simply because they're a pain in the arse - I want to get rid of them because there are
better and
simpler ways to solve the problems! The only "emissions control system" that actually works without screwing anything else up is the PCV/CCV setup - everything else becomes either a trade-off or a balancing act (usually both,) and one device usually makes others necessary.
I can eliminate nearly the whole damned setup, replace it with a technology devised during WWII (as a performance enhancer for piston-driven aircraft, no less!) and improve things all around.
Get rid of the damned visual inspection! Keep the tailpipe sniffer test. And, I honestly say that a sliding discount should be made available for motorheads like us who can reduce emissions still further! If we can make a 25-year-old vehicle run cleaner than a two-year-old vehicle, that effort should be rewarded, no?
The state's budget problems are not my concern, except insofar as the State Assembly requires budget counselling as a whole. Let's see...
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They failed to understand that any system will equalise after a major swing. The recession is not helping, but it's a natural movement after so much "boom time."
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They kept spending money like you wouldn't believe, instead of laying some aside.
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They kept offering contracts that were far more lucrative than needed (ex: San Jose. I'd just read about the SJPD chief retiring late last year, and cashing out on something like $350-400K in unused sick leave. Yeah -
great stinkin' idea, and that's another hit to the budget.)
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They consider themselves above the rules they lay on us. In a recession, they tell us to "revise our budgets, tighten our belts, and run lean to ride it out." They don't run lean - they just crank up taxes and fees (and never do reduce them afterwards.)
- And, when they finally
do start cutting things to "live within their means" (after all, every dollar that gets paid into taxation is a dollar removed from productive service in the economy...) they cut programmes like, oh; education, public safety, libararies, and the like. Heaven help us they should actually set an example by taking a pay cut - they force all those "furlough days" on state workers (there are probably too many of them, but that's a subject for another discussion,) but I have yet to hear of any State-level Congresscritters saying, "We're going to take a pay cut to help out. We're not going to look for it to be replaced as 'back pay,' either."
Of course, one of the smartest things we could have had done to hammer out the "budget crisis" (running without one for so long) is to penalise the Congresscritters for not passing it - if the budget still isn't passed by the deadline, all
elected 'officials' will serve unpaid until the budget is resolved and passed.
All of them. And
no back pay - you keep screwin' around, you keep losin' money. Not. My. Problem.
Most of the reason the budget didn't pass was partisan bickering. Most of the problems we have politically (in general) are due to partisan bickering. I liked the way things used to be done - when we were just starting out, the President was the man who got the most votes, and the Vice President was the man who got the second-most. This
forced the parties to learn to work together.
Perhaps a return to this is indicated?
