[DeTomaso] Rolling smog exemption for California

MikeLDrew at aol.com MikeLDrew at aol.com
Wed Dec 5 09:58:31 EST 2012


Hi guys,

Picked this up off the GT40 forum from a guy named A. Watkins who lives 
near San Francisco.   He is just going through the process of getting his 
Superformance GT40 titled and licensed, and in describing it, he added this:

====

There is a brand new process in CA associated with the old "special 
interest" vehicle license that allows collector cars (defined as fewer than 1,000 
sold in CA, unmodified, covered by collector car insurance, and at least 35 
years old (that's 1979 next month) ) to be exempted from the biennial smog 
inspection and the visual inspection at registration time. I spoke to someone 
at BAR and came away uncertain as to whether there would be a tail-pipe 
test, but if there were it would be one appropriate for the year so for older 
cars would probably be easy to pass just by leaning it out at idle.

There is an associated questionnaire 

http://www.smogcheck.ca.gov/80_BARResources/ftp/pdfdocs/Collector%20Motor%20Vehicle%20QA.pdf
which contains some explanatory text and references to the state codes. 

The relevant new state code is from SB 734 Senate Bill - CHAPTERED which 
says in part:
"a collector motor vehicle, as defined in Section 259 of the Vehicle Code, 
is exempt from those portions of the test required by subdivision (f) of 
Section 44012 [visual inspection] if the collector motor vehicle meets all of 
the following criteria:
(1) Submission of proof that the motor vehicle is insured as a
collector motor vehicle, as shall be required by regulation of the bureau.
(2) The motor vehicle is at least 35 model-years old.
(3) The motor vehicle complies with the exhaust emissions
standards for that motor vehicle's class and model-year as prescribed by 
the department, and the motor vehicle passes a functional inspection of the 
fuel cap and a visual inspection for liquid fuel
leaks."
So, in some respects we are released from the current "1975 or older" 
exemption and can now register more and more old machinery as the years go by 
(I'm thinking Berlinetta Boxer) without having to worry about grey-market 
add-on catalytic converters, etc. The cars is supposed to be unmodified, so you 
get to run the "Euro" version here.

=======

This is potentially good news for Californians who aspire to ownership of a 
grey-market Pantera, such as a GT5 or GT5-S.   In a few years, registration 
shouldn't be a problem....

Mike


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