EPA Revokes Emissions Rule: What It Means for Trucking The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) has rescinded a key … mansfield.energy
Its not going anywhere. Things will change again in a couple years and we'll only see emissions get even stricter.
The engine manufacturers have invested too much money in research and development to meet the new standards. The only way to recoup that investment, is to sell those engines. I think the EPA changes are headed for court, not implementation. I don't see things going back to 1998 standards, but I could certainly be wrong.
I thought this was an update on your friends contaminated fuel
Lol. Nope, just ran across this, was the most un-political article I could find. There's a lot of speculation going on about it.
Emission equipment as it is today, has yielded high profits for manufactures. Besides what they have invested and have on hand plus warehouses full of replacement parts, those manufactures like the proceeds and so do investors. If they were to drop everything and return to pre-1998 standards they are going to want to make that up somehow. Those companies have control over industry, do not want to go back to suppling parts for 30 plus year old equipment/trucks/cars to be rebuilt over and over. As it is now they like the 15 years and done with it. imo.
It will only take one manufacture to start making pre 98 engines and make a killing for the rest to change their minds. PS, Cummins do make old school engines for the US military which could be released for civilian use.
Honestly, I would settle for dropping all off-highway engines down to Tier 3. The manufacturers already build them for export. If states want to impress their own BS, they could handle it however they choose.
If anything manufacturers would probably just remove the emission equipment from their current offerings. The cost to retool a production line to mass produce N14s and Series 60s for a year or two wouldn't be worth it.
By the time it gets to the Supreme Court there will be a new regime.
Cummins still makes the 903 V8 which is away older than the N14, just sayin
It will be tied up in courts, states like CA won’t care what federal law says, and so on so the safe bet will be no real changes In 2016 and 2024 the shops were abuzz with the hopes that Tier 4 would be removed or slackened and that R-1234yf would go away- it won’t. In fact I start my A/C and Tier 4 courses with: “Look you may not be a fan but you have to work on it and it’s not going anywhere, no matter who’s in the White House so you might as well learn to work on it”
They all make sane versions of their basic designs without all the crazy bolt on parts for military and export to Less Regulated Countries, all it would take to change would be a stroke of the pen.
And manufactures just might lobby against in a 180* turn to keep the revenue up. It's about money.
I don't really see it going away. It puts the OEMs in a bad place. If they just drop it, in a couple of years it could all come back with a different administration. Then they are behind three years of R & D plus the cost of all the manufacturing changes. I wish it was going away, but I don't see it happening. The most I see is them not going after deletes as much. What if companies are allowed to delete their trucks and in a few years that changes. Look at all the cost to reinstall or replace trucks and the parts bottle neck that could be. It will be interesting to see what happens.
Could they simply do a Delete ? Like aftermarket is already doing ?
I don’t see it going away, maybe some EPA approved software updates to go easy on de-rating. What I do see is possibly no more Fed enforcement on delete parts and shops. We could possibly get by for three years until the next regime takes over. Fleets could save $ millions.
I think they have already/ or going to be relaxing the farming side of emissions- longer time to derate parameters and the right to repair. I would welcome that as a start on the on road side also, building up to something that provides a longer lasting engine, less cost of acquisition/ ownership/ repair while not taking clean air for granted. It felt to me like we jumped out of the plane with no parachute over emissions. There has to be a middle ground so we do this at a pace that doesn't run everyone over.
Couple sides to it--Manufactures knew emissions were coming all the way back to late 70's. All chose to kick the can down the road until time was running out then forced to comply. Building--- using the consumer as guinea pig. And everyone got pi--ed and rightly so. They saw what was taking place in auto industry and knew what was coming their way. They had time to do a better job, but chose not to. * As far as deletes go--that is going to depend on who is doing it, especially if unit is under warranty. Which means dealer authorized and performed delete. It's not going to be a Johnny Bob and still meet warranty coverage. Costs will be extensive or warranty will be nullified.
And what about all the "cheating emissions" lawsuits a few years ago ? IIRC VW really got hit hard. Is this why CAT got out of the OTR truck engines business as well ?
Cat wasn't cutting it and receiving constant huge fines, is the reason.
Cat jumps in markets, and leaves those markets, so fast. It just depends on what is profitable to them. Truck engines became un-profitable in the scheme of things.
Cat from info I was told was fined for each engine it produced out of spec.
I don't recall any Cat engines out of spec while I worked for the dealer. Lots of International morphodites received fines.
Caterpillar To Recall Engines, Pay $2.5M in EPA Penalties Photo by Tudor Van Hampton for ENR Between 2002 and 2006, Caterpillar allegedly shipped 590,000 diesel engines that were missing emission controls. It has agreed to pay $2.55 million and recall non-compliant engines, according to a federal consent order. Related Links: Caterpillar, EPA Clear the... www.enr.com
Cat got jammed up from a batch of engines in 02/03 and had to retire all their Nox credits.
Interesting trying to find this thread, but I found it.
I remember a Cat valve cover sticker on a truck 3208 in 1989 that said the emissions were too high but the fine had been paid.
Perhaps that was the 3208 in my buddies single axle dump truck. The exhaust would burn my eyes something fierce! I was loading him with a 120 from a low bench and the exhaust came right at me...
That was standard for a 3208, mosquito control.
How about a 3204? What was weird with mine after a rebuilt was it was going through oil like crazy because the rings didn't seat but there was no smoke at all. Even the rebuild shop was surprised when they drove it across their yard into the shop. Have no idea where the oil was going. They thought maybe it was just that efficient that it was burning the oil so clean.
Yeah disposable crap engines they were. I didn't like working on them at all. All the goofy regs would cease, if all the big company's together as one, said its this or mass layoffs and closed doors. Along with the trashed economy that would follow.
That would require those in charge to stick to their guns--we all know that won't happen. Money controls, better to have some than none.
3208's were OK in some applications. Some people liked them. One guy told me awhile ago they were OK in a medium truck application but terrible in an excavator where they needed constant high RPM power. He said that's what gave the original 225 excavator a bad reputation. You don't hear about 225's very often. Probably because they've all met their grave.
I think there's some misunderstanding because there are two types of regulations at play. One type of regulations or standards is trying to increase efficiency of internal combustion engines so they use less fuel for the same amount of work (e.g. miles per gallon). This helps reduce the amount of carbon dioxide produced when burning fuel. Carbon dioxide is a greenhouse gas (not my opinion, it's just the official definition). Back in the day, the US administration "classified greenhouse gases as pollution that endangers public health" which meant enforcing emissions control fell under the EPA (just like cleaning up abandoned toxic waste sites). The other type of regulation is reducing the pollutants like NOx, particulates, fuel vapors, etc. These are the things that cause smog, acid rain, etc. DEF doesn't affect carbon dioxide output, DEF only reduces the nitrogen oxides (NOx). The current US administration effectively had carbon dioxide delisted as a pollutant so enforcing limits on carbon dioxide emissions is no longer under the EPA because it no longer endangers public health. That's really all the article is saying in the OP's first post. So I don't think DEF or any of the current emissions stuff will fade anytime soon as all that stuff is really aimed at reducing all the other pollutants besides carbon dioxide. Engine manufacturers may receive relaxed limits in how they must increase "miles per gallon" for their engines but that's probably the only relaxation. And it was this 'increased mpg' reason why electric vehicles have been pushed so hard to be incorporated into fleets as the EVs made the total carbon dioxide emissions get averaged down to meet standard. Without the need to decrease carbon dioxide outputs, I doubt EVs, especially for heavy equipment, will make sense in the near future.
On a side note, I'm about to go look at a small Hyster diesel forklift with what I think is Tier III controls on it. The guy selling it is frustrated with all the electronic systems that he can't troubleshoot easily. He can get it to crank but not start. He's cracked the injector lines but can't get fuel out during crank. It's a Kubota engine so I'm hoping it's a simple electronic fuel shutoff issue or such but won't know until I see it in person. The point is I think the emissions stuff, or even efficiency enhancements, went way too far when little 6,000 pound forklifts require advanced training and laptops for basic troubleshooting.
$5k give or take, plus your own laptop, will get you in the door with equipment diagnosis software, all brands. Maybe do some better than others. I wish it cost less but that was the deal I could find. There are a couple of vendors on here.