I've seen a little bit of this already. I didn't think too much of it at the time.
Rob at ATP tuned my Duramax many years ago, and I bought quite a few parts from him as well to supplement the tune. Rob has been in business for years and at the time had the quickest Duramax in the country, and tuned/sold parts for everyone around the country. Great guy to deal with, excellent service, and a top notch tuner.
So last year late summer I get a message from him letting me know if I need any more tuning I need to get with him asap because the EPA had come in and was shutting him down. Making it too difficult for him to sustain his business. Sure enough not long after he closed his doors for good.
Getting closer to Christmas time my son asked for a set of long tube headers for his 89 Mustang. He already had an off road X on the car with the factory shorty headers that he installed a few years ago. Knowing I'd need another X I tried to order another off road X with the long tube headers, only to find out that all the big companies like BBK, Pypes etc... completely stopped manufacturing the off road X and H pipes. They were simply no longer available unless I bought a catted version for triple the price.
I said screw it, and shortened the X on the car and rewelded it to fit the new long tube headers.
So apparently this has been going on now for a while, and they have already either shut down business or affected sales in the auto industry.
How far it will go is hard to say. All the more reason I'm glad we sold all our new cars and just drive 50+ year old stuff that was made long before all this strict emissions stuff you see on new cars today.
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