I read about many people who cut off their catalyctic conv. for a horsepower gain (where there aren't laws to prevent this), i'm all good with the HP gain, but the fact that a car polutes an insane amount w/o a cat. annoys me.. I read an article in Scientific American about catalyctic convertors, some actually help clean up the air by taking emmsions of vehicles w/ bad cats, or none and making the air cleaner then it was in the first place. So my basic questions is, is the hp gain worth fucking the enviroment over? ... I'm not some hippy activist or anything, just that article got me thinking a bit.. i want your input on this issue.. Thanks, Julien Actually there are Federal E.P.A. Laws prohibiting removing any factory emissions equipment on cars sold in the U.S., and the fine if caught is Huge! Not all states do smog testing, but it's still illegal to remove the cat. Catalytic converters greatly reduce tailpipe emissions regardless of the car's state of tune and a car will never run cleaner without a cat than with a cat, unless the cat is clogged, severely contaminated, or it's ceramic core dislodged. I've tested my Golf GTi without the cat in place and it barely passed the test, then when i retested it with the 150,000 mile cat in place the emissions were reduced like 80%. It did suck a few horsepower (100 HP engine). My concience won't allow me to run my daily driver without a cat, and here in California the CARB sets up roadside sniffers and surprise portable smog test trailers. A VW friend of mine got caught and had to go to court. His lawyer was able to negotiate the fine down to $2,500 and he has to have all of his cars tested every year at a State referee station for the next three years, where our normal test intervals are every two years. The Feds don't screw around when it comes to EPA stuff !!
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