running a federal ecu on a CA emission car (Edit: Now with even more emissions ?

[idreamidrive]

Sorry for this being my first post, but I have a problem

About to buy a gvr4 and the owners were nice enough to replace the battery, but in doing so... I guess the ecu got fried. I half assed search for my answer and got a maybe, but does anybody know if a federal ecu will "work" in a CA emissions car?

 

[JamesFoster]

Should be fine.

 

[moduleunknown]

It will work.

The only difference I'm aware of is the EGR system. CA car has an EGR solenoid operated by the ECU and an EGR temp sensor that monitors the system. Federal car does not have an EGR solenoid and uses a thermal valve.

A Stock federal ECU will not operate your EGR system.

This doesn't mean you can't pass CA smog though. I passed emissions with a bad EGR valve (failed for the valve functionality of course). All they check as far as functionality of the valve; they connect a vacuum pump to open it and see that it alters your idle - making the car stumble and almost die (or die out). That test can be passed as long as a valve exists (and none of the passages are blocked) on the car regardless of whether or not the entire system is functioning properly.

I just went through all this myself.

If there are any other differences, hopefully someone will chime in.

 

[idreamidrive]

Thank you so much for that info.

Now the real question is does anybody have a spare ecu laying around?

 

[idreamidrive]

I didnt want to bombard this place with my stupid posts so I am adding it to here.

I have a new problem.

Went to go get the car smogged and since I had no idea what the car would do since I bought it out of state I had a pretest done. It passed with flying colors, but they said the timing was advanced to 15. They also found a sensor unplugged and plugged it back in before running the test for real. They set the timing to 5. Apparently these two things killed me, as now I am a gross polluter on idle for the HC. The thing that kills me is that it was idling like crap after they set the timing and never adjusted the idle screw. So I am thinking the combo of this and maybe what ever the sensor is might be what made my HC bounce up.

Anybody know what this sensor is for?




Thanks in advanced to anyone that helps. I can send hand made PB&J's through the mail for help

 

[toybreaker]

pm me your phone number and I can walk you thru a few things to check/verify before you re-test.