loud exhaust citations

[tirebird]

California and a few other states uses an SAE standard to determine what qualifies as an illegally loud exhaust. Police officers are allowed to cite what they think is an illegal exhaust and the car owner must go to a smog referee station and have his or her exhaust tested.

The state uses SAE standard:J1169, which reads in part according to this SEMA document:

"The SEMA model provides for the testing of vehicle exhaust noise to a standard adopted by the Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE) with an established noise limit of 95-decibels (SAE J1169). Under the SAE standard, a sound meter is placed 20 inches from the exhaust outlet at a 45-degree angle and the engine is revved to three quarters of maximum rated horsepower. The highest decibel reading is then recorded."

My question to you Yenko site gearheads is the part of the standard that reads; "...revved to three quarters of maximum rated horsepower."

How do you do that? Is that the same as maximum rpm recommended for any particular engine, in other words, the redline?

No, to calm any curiosity, I haven't got any ticket but my LS-6 with dual 3" exhaust and two Super 40 Flowmasters is probably close to that standard.

John

[JChlupsa]

Guess CHP will have to start pulling portable DYNO's behind their cars. Whats the cost of the ticket? Cheaper than paying to get a DYNO pull done

Good Question though, how do they know what 3/4 of the cars HP is???

[bbdon]

Maybe they would go to 3/4 of the rpm for max rated horsepower. Example, if max power is at 6000 RPM, they could test at 4500. That sounds reasonable enough.

[tirebird]

Of course, the smog police would have to know what the maximum hp, at what rpm, of every car made or sold in the golden state. That's quite a data base.

My guess, is you're correct Don. They just rev up the car until the meter register's 96db, and then issue a fix it ticket. I assume that if the violater doesn't fix the car, then it goes on his or her record as a "mover". But I may be wrong.

[Dave Rifkin]

Are they going to give citations to the guys with Harleys who have the straight pipes that have a habit of revving their engines? I swear they are louder and more annoying than any musclecar.

[tirebird]

They do write up the Harley's,..although the bike owners I talk to just shrug it off as one of the hazards of owning a loud cycle.

[JTH74]

Put some electronic exhaust cut-outs in your exhaust system, that way it can be loud when you want it and quiet when you don't, and they work from inside the car, very conveinent!

[427TJ]

I'll tell you right now that no cops are pulling guys over for loud exhausts unless the offending party is doing something else first, say, speeding or burning rubber. They might be writing citations for noise but only after the offender has talked himself down from a speeding ticket.

I attended my local traffic school last November. (Oops.) The officer teaching the class was asked about loud exhausts and most of the 50+ class attendees wanted to know why there is so much car (fart pipe) and motorcycle noise in town. The weak answer from the officer was that there are some laws that they just don't enforce. I had to raise my hand and ask for clarification: "Are you saying that there are laws which you don't enforce?" (I wanted to make him clearly admit it in front of 50 taxpayers.) He kind-of shrugged and nodded 'Yes.' That's when the more senior officer in the back of the room stepped in and said that we needed to keep the class moving so we could finish on time. In other words: Don't go there .

Relax, there's no (enforced) limit to the amount of noise you can make with your vehicle unless you do something else first, like run a stop sign. The last thing the police want to do is get into a pissing match with some big biker over the straight pipes on his Harley. Add to that the intense lobbying efforts by the aftermarket (SEMA, etc.) to keep such noise-increasing products on the market (and selling like hot cakes), and it's practically guaranteed that no one will be denied their right to make as much noise as they want to, any time they want to, in any neighborhood they want to.

Granted, I'm speaking from experience with my local law enforcement. Your experience may vary.

[k92]

In Illinois you can be stopped for just the offense of loud or defective exhaust.Most officers that I know of, including myself, use it as a way to find probable cause to stop a vehicle that we think may be commiting other crimes i.e D.U.I., open liquor,drugs.

[RichSchmidt]

The have a much more expansive database then just that.They have databases with pictures of every single smog controlled engine configuaration ever made,and how every smog related piece of equipment is placed right down to the hose sizes of this equipment.They have databases to decode what the original engine is for any smog controlled car ever made,as well as how much horsepower,and pollution every single engine makes.Their database has to go back to at least 1968 with smog related info,and a few years later I think they enacted their own smog regualtions,and only cars with their regualtions were allowed to be registered in the state.I doubt many of the supercars would have even been legal according to their regulations.with the elimination of smog exemption for historic cars in Cali,I am sure they are dusting off the old books to make sure that every 396 camaro and 454 chevelle in their golden state has the correct part number smog pump on it,and the correct vacum hose routing and all that fun stuff.Since there really isnt a market for 50 state legal stuf for cars this old,you can prety much figure that any 60's era car with headers,a hot rod intake,a holley carb where one shouldnt be or even a few missing vacum hoses will be taken off the road by the smog gestopo.