CA law for out of state cars

[intense 620]

i am going to talk to my hubby's buddy tupper.he is chp down here in riverside so i will get the scoop and let yall know

[Shagy]

This concept comes back up every now and again.... LEGALLY the motor you put into the car has to pass smog for the year that it was issued. So a "JDM" or NON USDM motor will not work. No matter WHAT year your car is....and you can only go newer on the motors, never backwards. IE, a 88 blazer can not put a '81 motor in it, but can put a '91 motor in. there is a certificate that comes with the Ref's Okay also.

[thisismatt]

i am going to talk to my hubby's buddy tupper.he is chp down here in riverside so i will get the scoop and let yall know

The scoop on what? Let's not ask any LEO or DMV employees anything about it. No good will come from asking them about it and putting the idea of emissions compliance and motor swaps on their radar. 75 and older vehicles don't require smog inspections, but yes, they're still required to meet the federally mandated epa regulations of their year. Look on your door tag and it should say what emissions standards the vehicle meets. Since there are no inspections, however, most people get away with removing the old emissions equipment and/or do motor swaps lacking emissions equipment. CARB is fine* with motor swaps, but they motor has to be at least as new as the vehicle and retain ALL emissions related equipment that came with the newer motor, which includes cat(s), complete evap system, egr, pcv, etc, plus they don't allow any modifications that aren't specifically CARB approved, like aftermarket intakes, headers, etc. There are also federal EPA laws that carry a hefty fine if broken, like tampering with, removing, or swapping catalytic converters - again this is federal, not just CA. You can be fined in any state for removing a catalytic converter, or using an aftermarket one.

 

Again, though, none of this will ever come to light unless for some reason a cop or other official has reason to look under your hood and finds out what you've changed, and this isn't likely to happen for no good reason.

 

If you read the 2nd page on the Application For Title Or Registration, here ( http://www.dmv.ca.gov/forms/reg/reg343.pdf ), you will see everything that the CA DMV looks for when applying for a CA registration of an out of state vehicle. They only check the motor if it's a motorcycle, and don't care on autos/trucks. The motor in my 521 is not numbers matching and they didn't care (didn't even look as far as I could tell). This isn't to say that you won't run into an anal DMV employee who might refer you to a CHP inspection for CARB compliance when he sees your motor swap that obviously doesn't look original. My advice there would be to make it look as stock as possible before you take it in to register it. For a truck they will also require a weight certificate from a public weighmaster. This includes even our tiny Datsun pickups, because all trucks, even small pickups, are classified as commercial vehicles in CA and are subject to additional registration fees based on weight (thus, very low for a Datsun truck since they're lighter than most cars these days).

 

*I use the term "fine" pretty loosely, as they have strict rules regarding what you can & can't swap/change/modify.

[datsunaholic]

^^^^^

 

This is true of all States, not just California. EPA Federal laws require all emissions equipment to be in compliance. For Federal emissions cars, this is all 1968 and newer passenger cars and light trucks, which all Datsuns fall under.

 

However, while it is a Federal law, enforcement is left up to the individual States, per those States compliance with EPA regulations. That's why you can get away with putting a no-smog 454 in anything in some States, whereas you'd get the car confiscated in others. States (and within those the individual counties) with no testing and no inspections aren't likely to find out that you have a JDM engine in your car, but move to a State that does, or have your State start testing, you'll find out very quickly that that swap wasn't legal. The lack of enforcement of a law doesn't mean it's legal to ignore it. It's much like doing 61MPH on a 60 MPH Speed Limit freeway... generally you aren't going to have a problem, but find one cop who wants to be a pain, and you're still headed to traffic court.

[dat521kid]

All this is very helpful, I did find it rather odd that the owner didn't register the car in CA once he bought it. I'll just keep looking for one that has been registered and running in CA. Thank you all

[DJ Hentai]

It's not really about the environment in CA. It's about money.

 

Used to live in Riverside (home of the Bro Life. lol) Case in point, my Pop's '73 CJ-5 had to be smog checked before the rolling exemption year hit it (this is about ten years ago I think) and we have a 401 AMC V8 underhood. Had an edelbrock manifold, holly 650 quad, etc. on it. When run thru the test, it passed with flying colors on emissions, yet failed on visual. My pops had a Ref. leter signed excluding the parts on it, but the station refused to accept it and called in their own ref, who denied it, and told him he had to put the stock manifold and carb on it.

 

So we find some stock parts, buy them, put them on, and re-test. Passes visual, runs damn near failing on the emissions (way dirtier than with the other parts.) and gets passed.

 

I love NM. no smog testing except for Bernallillo county. I used to be a certified inspector there, and the test was pretty easy to pass even there. Nothing like CA.