CA Smog questions - 04 Cobra

Hey all, it’s been forever since I’ve posted here.

I’ve searched around and maybe I just don’t have the right combination of key words, but I have some questions about smog on my old cobra. My buddy bought the car from me 2009 - 2010ish as it sits with just a upper pulley, magnaflow x-pipe (circa 2004), a cold air intake and a tune.

I never once had any problem with this car passing smog when I had it, no trickery involved. Now the ca ref station is trying to say the car has to be 100% stock down to the computer to pass. I mean the car is 16 years old, and those parts have been on there since it was new. As far as mods go that’s really not a lot, but there’s gotta be a way to tell the smog nazis to shove it.

Is putting the car back to 100% stock really the only way to get this car smogged now? That seems like a little bit much.

As far as the mods go you will need the factory Hpipe, the cold air can stay if it has a CARB EO number JLT and K&N are the only ones that have these for our vehicles, also the pulley can stay as long just stay out of boost. The car will have to be flashed by a Ford dealership or return the car to stock using whatever tuner you used to put the mod tune on it. Once that is done finalize a drive cycle.

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Pulley will need to be swapped unless you have the belt guard. The smaller pulley isn't legal. So basically yes, you need to go back to stock.

Things have changed within one last year. They've tightened up on smog shops quite a bit.

The first time I was sent to a ref, he actually measured the pulley diameter through the beltguard. So yes, you have to have a 3.65 diameter pulley on it to pass.

Really sucks nowadays

Wow, crazy. I’ve been out of the game for a while now but that all seems like a huge pain. So even a car that hasn’t been touched in 16 years mod wise needs to be returned to stock to pass smog. Unreal. I hate California.

Fast69Mach said:

Wow, crazy. I’ve been out of the game for a while now but that all seems like a huge pain. So even a car that hasn’t been touched in 16 years mod wise needs to be returned to stock to pass smog. Unreal. I hate California.

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Yours is actually very easy to return to stock (unless you don't have the stock parts any longer). I think we have Cali members taking off whipples, long tubes, etc.....now that's quite a return job

P49Y-CY said:

The first time I was sent to a ref, he actually measured the pulley diameter through the beltguard. So yes, you have to have a 3.65 diameter pulley on it to pass.

Really sucks nowadays

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That's the first I've heard that happening. Couple of local guys that have gone to ref have had 2.76 or 2.8 pulleys

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Fast69Mach said:

Wow, crazy. I’ve been out of the game for a while now but that all seems like a huge pain. So even a car that hasn’t been touched in 16 years mod wise needs to be returned to stock to pass smog. Unreal. I hate California.

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The biggest issue I think is the tune. Tuners were taking the easy way out and turning off monitors. In the past they would just show up as unsupported. But now the machines know how many monitors each car should have. So if your car is supposed to have 7 and only 6 are available then it throws up a red flag.

c6zhombre said:

Yours is actually very easy to return to stock (unless you don't have the stock parts any longer). I think we have Cali members taking off whipples, long tubes, etc.....now that's quite a return job

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If it was still my car, sure it wouldn’t really be a problem. I bought the car with those mods on it and stock parts long gone. I didn’t even have a tuner with it. But that’s not really the point, just that I never had a problem before and now everything is so strict.

02gt87 said:

That's the first I've heard that happening. Couple of local guys that have gone to ref have had 2.76 or 2.8 pulleys

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it probably depends oh the person doing the test. that first time i mentioned, it was an older guy who was sort of uptight lol. he was strictly by the book and even though it passed smog, he failed me because my exhaust was like two decibels over the noise limit. (i was sent for both smog and exhaust noise that first time)

but the second time i was sent (normal biannual smog), it was a younger fellow and at a different location. he didn't seem as thorough, and i don't think that he checked my pulley diameter that time. plus he seemed cooler to talk to

either way i always expect the worst

01yellercobra said:

The biggest issue I think is the tune. Tuners were taking the easy way out and turning off monitors. In the past they would just show up as unsupported. But now the machines know how many monitors each car should have. So if your car is supposed to have 7 and only 6 are available then it throws up a red flag.

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It's not just the monitors. The state can now tell if you have a tune or not because of how the handhelds marry to the computer. If I remember correctly it scrambles one of the digits in the cal code and the state computer picks that up.

might be time to leave comifornia. just saying...

BlckBox04 said:

might be time to leave comifornia. just saying...

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I’m outta here as soon as I can be. Just gotta wait a few more years.

Blkkbgt said:

It's not just the monitors. The state can now tell if you have a tune or not because of how the handhelds marry to the computer. If I remember correctly it scrambles one of the digits in the cal code and the state computer picks that up.

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I think it changes the VIN entirely. Last time I was smogged I pulled the VIN up on my hand held and it showed an SCT VIN. I never thought to check with the normal scanner I have.

01yellercobra said:

I think it changes the VIN entirely. Last time I was smogged I pulled the VIN up on my hand held and it showed an SCT VIN. I never thought to check with the normal scanner I have.

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Interesting, wonder why is does that.

I don't know exactly what it does, @decipha does, but there's a change, somewhere, that the SCT handheld does to a line of code, somewhere in the PCM, that "marries" it to the PCM and the guys over at the CA BAR can see that and know the car has an aftermarket tune on it.

HPLouis said:

I don't know exactly what it does, @decipha does, but there's a change, somewhere, that the SCT handheld does to a line of code, somewhere in the PCM, that "marries" it to the PCM and the guys over at the CA BAR can see that and know the car has an aftermarket tune on it.

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Does HP tuners leave that type of mark?

me32 said:

Does HP tuners leave that type of mark?

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I wouldn’t know. I know the marriage part of the SCT X4 is what leaves a mark in the code of the PCM. I don’t know how HP Tuners work.

I know SCT does it so you can’t use one X4 to tune multiple cars.


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HPLouis said:

I wouldn’t know. I know the marriage part of the SCT X4 is what leaves a mark in the code of the PCM. I don’t know how HP Tuners work.

I know SCT does it so you can’t use one X4 to tune multiple cars.


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Im wondering if ill have an issue this year. I still have an X2 ive been using on my GT500. But still marries it too the car. Smog year for me.

me32 said:

Im wondering if ill have an issue this year. I still have an X2 ive been using on my GT500. But still marries it too the car. Smog year for me.

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If you load the base tune back, put it back to stock in the tune, it will remove the fingerprint.


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