OK

Now that I got that rant out of my system ( see below) I feel good enough to share a couple of anecdotes about my person emissions experiences.

The Pacer - I think I've written here before about the burgundy pacer that I drove around with...it rocked. I was so embarrased of it that when I had my first date with Mrs. Flick I made her drive AND I made her drop me on the corner a block away from my car for fear that she'd see what I drove and refuse to go out with me again. It almost backfired as she though that I the reason I wouldn't let her near my house was that I was married and hiding her from my wife. But that's not my point.

Jus before we got married, I moved in with Mrs. Flick for about a month. So one Saturday morning I loaded everything I owned into the Pacer and started to make the drive to her place about 30 miles away. I hadn't had the Pacer on a trip that far in quite a while so just before I left I popped the hood to add a little oil. When I looked into the manmoth V8 engine block I noticed that there were a bunch of hoses detached and a couple of feet of tubing shoved over to the side of the engine block. This modification must have been done, for some reason, by the previous owner as it was obvious by the placement of things that it wasn't a random happening.

So wanting to make sure that everything was going to run right for my big trip, I reattached all the tubing and set out along my way.

I got onto the highway and imagine that I was quite a sight. The fishbowl looking car was filled to the gills. Even the passenger seat was shoved full to the ceiling with shit...I literally had everything I had owned in the car and was barely able to carve out pigeon holes for both the side window and rear view mirror.

About 10 miles into the trip I started smelling something funny. 12 miles into the trip my windows started clouding up !?! 15 miles into the trip I started getting dizzy !!!??? Then a little voice in my head said to me, " Hi...this is the little voice in your head...how ya doin ?.....yeah you might want to pull over, you're about to die of carbon monoxide poisoning"

I yanked the steering wheel right and slammed on the brakes. As soon as the car stopped and the wind efect of traveling 55 mph stopped venting whatever was filling the car, the vehicle immediately filled with massive amounts of thick white smoke. Paniced I pulled the door handle and rolled out onto the tarmac.

As I tried to get my head about me and fill my lungs with fresh air, I watched smoke envelope the still running car. I laid there in dispair as my car, and everything I owned on the planet, was about to burn to a crisp.

Then something caught my eye.

From my position on the ground I could see under the car. And it looked like that was where most of the smoke was coming from. I crawled over and looked a little closer. When I got up next to the car I saw what was happening. Oil was pouring out of the car and directly onto the super-hot catalydic converter. As soon as the oil hit the cc, it bursth into a think smoke and filled the inside of the car. But why now ? Why me ? Then I remember hooking all those tubes up.

I hopped up, popped the hood, reached into the block and started pulling. Anything that was hooked up to the carborator or anything that looked like an emissions control had to go. I pulled, and I yanked, and I toss about 35 feet worth of rubber tubing into the woods. When I was done i walked around to the side of the car and looked underneath. No oil, no smoke, no problem.

I closed the hood, I got back in the car, and I drove the rest of the way to Mrs. Flicks house without incident. That car ran great for the next 3 months and I never had an oil or smoke problem again....although most of my shit did smell pretty stinky for a while.