Harley Davidson forced to buy epa stoves

Gubment is at it again. HD busted for selling tuners, and as punishment, must buy epa stoves for designated communities. Who thinks up a punishment like that? Gvmt....that's who.

EPA: Harley-Davidson Must Buy Stoves As Punishment For Air Violations

 

Strange, how about that big scam by Volkswagen. How come they didn't have to buy any stoves as punishment? O wait I know, why would this government punish foreign company?

 

Don't worry, VW has to buy the cars back, and also pay $billions to the EPA.

 

I was going to post this earlier.

The item was intended for street use. That's why they got into trouble. All of the rest of the tuners are for race use only. I know, it's a fine line, but HD has been playing on the line for years.

 

I was thinking about the epa today. It amazes me that they make such a big deal out of emissions equipment on new machinery. Then they don't regulate and test it afterward. I'm referring to diesel.
You can buy a brand new tier 4 final truck, rip all the emissions equipment off, and not worry about any consequences. Then out of nowhere they take down Harley Davidson?

We could get our country out of debt with fines from the epa haha. If they out of nowhere started pulling trucks over and inspecting emissions equipment they would have a gold mine.

I'm not for or against the epa, I just think their logic is sort of flawed. If they would outlaw and destroy any pre emissions machinery and enforce current emissions equipment it would get them right to their end result much quicker.

Instead, the older machinery and deleted emissions kits wipe out all of their efforts going forward. It's just a big circle.

 

In 7 counties in SE Wisconsin, if your diesel car or truck is a 2007 or newer, you have to pass emissions testing to get plates. Gasoline engine cars and trucks 96 and newer have to go in for testing too.
I'm sure there are other states that have similar regulations.

It's a costly thing to add emissions tests stations as state government owned facilities. We used to have several state owned emissions test stations in these counties. Those have all been sold and the testing has been privatized. Now certain local repair shops have been designated as testing sites. Really, the car's ECU'S have become more sophisticated than the test stations equipment, so really the handheld scanners you can buy are all that the test stations have.

They look for catalytic converters too, but if you've got those, or appear to have them, and you have no CEL on, you'll pass. One thing is that if any other lights are on the dash, like an ABS light, the station's cannot test you, not a fail, but if they cannot test you, you cannot pass, and cannot buy your registration.

The state of Maine had state owned test stations too. That proved to be costly and they closed those stations.

 

This doesn't sound like it was from out of nowhere.

Here's another article, from a bike specific website.

EPA Slaps Harley-Davidson with $12 Million Fine

 

Like I said, I'm not for or against the epa. I'm just saying if they really wanted to make a difference they could go back through and enforce previous emissions levels more thoroughly.

I am a diesel tech by the way. Most of what I do anymore is chase new machinery with a laptop. Throwing more computer controls on vehicles is great and all when it is still under warranty, but after that it can be very expensive as the machine ages. It's definitely a lot more sophisticated for a homeowner to work on their vehicle.

 

NY used to have private repair shops and gas stations do the emissions testing. It was very expensive for the owners to buy the equipment. $50-$75k. Then they shut the program down and went with the state computer hooking up to the car's OBDll port and making sure you had a gas cap on. Owners weren't happy. Can't have a CEL on or just recently replaced the battery. It takes a while for some cars to self test after a battery change. NY adopted CA regs so all the newer cars have CA emissions.

 

On gas cars, it's the evap system that takes a number of starts, a certain number of miles, and usually at least overnight to fully self diagnose and clear any codes to make the system ready to test.

 

Took almost 200 miles for our 2006 accord to clear all its tests. Had to take a 14 day reprieve and drive it around. It's an extra car and the battery went dead and the inspection shop is only 1/8 of a mile from us. Put on fifty miles before bringing it there.

 

Sounds about right. It is the 40-70 miles and an overnight sit of 6-8 hrs then a handful of restarts to get the evap system to be able to test. Typically that is.

Unfortunately I have far too much experience with this. . Luckily we only have to test our cars every other year. If they are new, you only have to go after the 3rd year. So a 2016 doesn't need an emissions test until 2019, but 2013 models are due in 2016.

 

Only because we let them, remember that.

 

All I got is, I'm shaking my head
What's next, go after aftermarket Mufflers etc.

 

Who wants self-driving cars forced on them by the EPA?
Say, yah or nay

 

I'm with you. I don't want that either. The fact is legislation is pushing for more and more nox and pm reduction. This means new machinery will be even more over engineered and unnecessarily complicated. It will only get worse. It will not stop. I just find it odd that they don't back track a little and focus on compliance with previous tiers

 

Oh!! I could go so political on this thread, but I won't, what are my grandkids going to have to deal with

 

This is an everyday nightmare for me. I work in agriculture. Lately it has been about a weekly tradition where I have to tell a farmer his machine is down until we can get out with a laptop .

If there is a fault that occurres and the computer thinks it has been tampered with it will begin a de-rate schedule where it gradually reduces power . If you don't fix it in time it will be reduced to idle. If there is a repeat offense with in 40 hours it goes straight back to idle and the alarm screams.