Jump to content
SAU Community

Recommended Posts

Here's the problem:

I got a letter in the mail today from the EPA stating that a police officer had lodged a report against my car because it was "excessively noisy". It goes on to say that I must take the car to an Approved Vehicle Noise Tester to determine whether it complies with the Environment Protection Vehicle Emissions Regulations. (There is a list of 24 Noise Testers across Victoria on the last page of the defect notice). After I obtain a Certificate of Compliance from the Noise Tester (asssuming I pass!), I must lodge it with the EPA by 20th February. It also says that it was not necessary to stop my vehicle in order for the police to file the report! All they needed was my rego.

There is some information contained in the letter about the noise tests.

"Maximum noise levels for stationary vehicles not to exceed 90 dB(A) for a passenger vehicle manufactured after 1st November 1983" (I've paraphrased slightly.)

So my questions are:

- What in particular do the noise tests involve? I have read elsewhere on the forum that you need to rev your car to a certain level, but how is this level determined? By engine capacity? Whatever the case, I am certain that my car will fail because it is f***ing loud! in which case...

- What are the options I can take prior to the test to ensure that I pass?

- Also (this part is mainly a whinge), isn't this stuff covered by a roadworthy and/or Certificate of Compliance? I'm talking about the Certificate of Compliance you get when you first import a car into the country. When I first registered my car last year after importing it (and getting my engineer's CoC), I was surprised that neither the engineer or Vic Roads did not say anything about the noise. I had it registered at the Burwood Vic Roads who are notorious for checking EVERYTHING, so I am a little surprised that nothing was mentioned at all about the excessive exhaust noise level. (As a side note, avoid getting your car registered at the Burwood Vic Roads, this is a tip from Dean at Ultimate Performance Imports in Moorabbin. The guy wouldn't pass my car because it was ONE CENTIMETRE too low! Plus he had this measuring stick thing which was supposed to fit under the car to test the height and he was banging it like nothing else against the exhaust tubing.)

Any comments or suggestions are welcome.

Link to comment
https://www.sau.com.au/forums/topic/33226-epa-noise-defect-notice/
Share on other sites

i got my epa in the mail a couple of weeks ago and failed my test(got 103db's).. put my stock cat back system on with cable ties(took a whole 10mins) and went back for the retest and they didnt even turn my car on.. just payed them $20 and they gave me a thing to send to the epa.. if you want to come borrow my stock cat back just let me know as iv allready put my 3" back on.. im in mentone

Not too steal the show, though I myself was looking at getting a cat-back soon for a R32 GTS-t. Being the brand-name guy I am, the APEXi N1 was looking great, though it exceeds the 90db limit. I was thinking of getting the Super Silencer fitted (welded), to reduce the noise, but thought I might find another good brand-name exhaust that works just as well and produces less noise.

Any ideas? 5Zigen? HKS? It's gotta be less than $1500.

he had this measuring stick thing which was supposed to fit under the car to test the height and he was banging it like nothing else against the exhaust tubing
Exactly the kind of Anti-import-Nazi stupid sh!t that everyones probably had to put up with at some stage... I bet he drives a Holden. (no offence to the 2 cool holden drivers on SAU)

He probably would've cut his stupid measuring stick down had an HQ been too low.

Thanks for the ideas everyone. I ended up calling William this morning who works with Gerald at Ice Performance. He was fantastic, told me to come right over even though it was his day off (he lives around the corner from me) and had a look at the car, fixed my boost gauge for free while he was at it! He knows one of the guys at the approved noise tester in Cheltenham, it's called Exhaust City on Park Road. William will take my car there first thing Monday and the dude will weld on a silencer and give me the certificate.

SKYL9 I was just about to ask where you got yours done. Good to know I'm taking it to the right place! I plan to get the silencer put on, get the certificate, then take it off again. :(

Well if the exhaust still sounds ok with the silencer then I might keep it on to keep the cops off my back, but I really like the sound at the moment, I don't want to lose my lovely exhaust note :)

Its no biggie.. you just take it to an approved tester.. give them 15 minutes and they'll do the required test and tell you want it read at and whether you pass or fail. If you "fail" you just get whatever modified and come back and try again.

1. Its a b.s. law and just comes from the officers "thoughts" of whether it is actually too loud or not. As he doesn't use any meter he just makes it up on the spot.

2. Its perfectly possible to pass with an aftermarket exhaust.. I passed at 89db with a full dump system, highflow cat and Super Dragger II catback. Most won't though, true.

3. Its 3/4 of the max rev range, so around 5200rpm for an R33

4. You don't have to send it to the EPA, just take it a testing station, and they forward it on when it passes and its all done. The test is around $30

5. Here is the list of testers.. just rock up to one http://www.epa.vic.gov.au/Noise/testers.asp

6. Please do a search in future, all this has been coverd COUNTLESS times as most people have been there one time or another

Re: 3/4 of rev range...

Do they take this from the tacho? If so - they're going to test me at 7500rpm! That's just a little unfair as I NEVER go that hard in suburbia - hell, I'm speeding in reverse at 7500!

Also - nearly finished my letter of complaint. The 'excessive' noise thing is a beauty. My car may be louder than a Daewoo - but it sure isn't excessive.

While its meant to be standard, he did mine at 5200?? there is a list of testing guidelines out there which list every little in and out.. they're out there (and on here) somewhere.

Its different for GTR though james so don't stress too much .. i remember at McLeod them telling me it was something else for GTR, but i forget what it was sorry.

The testing is done at 75% of where the car makes its maximum horsepower.

GTS-T's make maximum hp at 6400 rpm so they are tested at 4800 rpm.

GTR's make maximum hp at 6800rpm and they are tested at 5100 rpm.

Obviously when you modify your car with bigger cams and turbos etc. the point where you develop maximum hp on the rev range changes as well, luckily they don't get that anal and go with the factory figures.

The tester generally uses a multimeter to read the revs and verify your tachometer reading.

The microphone is placed at half a meter distance and 45 degree angle to the rear muffler.

consider yourself lucky i actually had to go to the epa site in macloed and i live in frankston. It was damn far. I passed with 85dB on a cat back 3.5 inch stainless kakimoto system. I also got a high powered vehicle fine on the way back for my troubles. Blardy cops. I eventually got off the high powered fine tho. but still pretty harsh after serving and passing an EPA summons.

with all these sound issues, it would be interesting to gather data of what exhaust system has been tested at which db...

so anyone else who's got their exhaust tested, maybe can post their db result and exhaust brand, and if it is cat back, turbo back or dump back, etc...

The thing which gives me the shits about this is, when you are sitting at a caffe and you can hear cars going by, yes skylines supras are louder than a pulsar or camry but they are nowhere near as loud as some hyundi's i hear which have aftermarket exhausts, which i am sure make the car louder than if they had no exhaust at all, actually v8 holden's aren't exactly quite either.

Guest
This topic is now closed to further replies.


  • Similar Content

  • Latest Posts

    • From there, it is really just test and assemble. Plug the adapter cables from the unit into the back of the screen, then the other side to the car harness. Don't forget all the other plugs too! Run the cables behind the unit and screw it back into place (4 screws) and you should now have 3 cables to run from the top screen to the android unit. I ran them along the DS of the other AV units in the gap between their backets and the console, and used some corrugated tubing on the sharp edges of the bracket so the wires were safe. Plug the centre console and lower screen in temporarily and turn the car to ACC, the AV should fire up as normal. Hold the back button for 3 sec and Android should appear on the top screen. You need to set the input to Aux for audio (more on that later). I put the unit under the AC duct in the centre console, with the wifi antenna on top of the AC duct near the shifter, the bluetooth antenna on the AC duct under the centre console The GPS unit on top of the DS to AC duct; they all seem to work OK there are are out of the way. Neat cable routing is a pain. For the drive recorder I mounted it near the rear view mirror and run the cable in the headlining, across the a pillar and then down the inside of the a pillar seal to the DS lower dash. From there it goes across and to one USB input for the unit. The second USB input is attached to the ECUtec OBD dongle and the 3rd goes to the USB bulkhead connected I added in the centre console. This is how the centre console looks "tidied" up Note I didn't install the provided speaker, didn't use the 2.5mm IPod in line or the piggyback loom for the Ipod or change any DIP switches; they seem to only be required if you need to use the Ipod input rather than the AUX input. That's it, install done, I'll follow up with a separate post on how the unit works, but in summary it retains all factory functions and inputs (so I still use my phone to the car for calls), reverse still works like factory etc.
    • Place the new daughterboard in the case and mount it using the 3 small black rivets provided, and reconnect the 3 factory ribbon cables to the new board Then, use the 3 piggyback cables from the daughterboard into the factory board on top (there are stand offs in the case to keep them apart. and remember to reconnect the antenna and rear cover fan wires. 1 screw to hold the motherboard in place. Before closing the case, make a hole in the sticker covering a hole in the case and run the cable for the android unit into the plug there. The video forgot this step, so did I, so will you probably. Then redo the 4 screws on back, 2 each top and bottom, 3 each side and put the 2 brackets back on.....all ready to go and not that tricky really.      
    • Onto the android unit. You need to remove the top screen because there is a daughterboard to put inside the case. Each side vent pops out from clips; start at the bottom and carefully remove upwards (use a trim remover tool to avoid breaking anything). Then the lower screen and controls come out, 4 screws, a couple of clips (including 3 flimsy ones at the top) and 3 plugs on the rear. Then the upper screen, 4 screws and a bunch of plugs and she is out. From there, remove the mounting brackets (2 screws each), 4 screws on the rear, 2 screws top and bottom and 3 screws holding in the small plates on each side. When you remove the back cover (tight fit), watch out for the power cable for the fan, I removed it so I could put the back aside. The mainboard is held in by 1 screw in the middle, 1 aerial at the top and 3 ribbon cables. If you've ever done any laptop stuff the ribbon cables are OK to work with, just pop up the retainer and they slide out. If you are not familiar just grab a 12 year old from an iphone factory, they will know how it works The case should now look like this:
    • Switching the console was tricky. First there were 6 screws to remove, and also the little adapter loom and its screws had to come out. Also don't forget to remove the 2 screws holding the central locking receiver. Then there are 4 clips on either side....these were very tight in this case and needed careful persuading with a long flat screw driver....some force required but not enough to break them...this was probably the fiddliest part of the whole job. In my case I needed both the wiring loom and the central locking receiver module to swap across to the new one. That was it for the console, so "assembly is the reverse of disassembly"
    • But first....while I was there, I also swapped across the centre console box for the other style where the AV inputs don't intrude into the (very limited !) space.  Part# was 96926-4GA0A, 284H3-4GA0B, 284H3-4GA0A. (I've already swapped the top 12v socket for a USB bulkhead in this pic, it fit the hole without modification:) Comparison of the 2: Basically to do the console you need to remove the DS and PS side console trim (they slide up and back, held in by clips only) Then remove the back half of the console top trim with the cupholders, pops up, all clips again but be careful at the front as it is pretty flimsy. Then slide the shifter boot down, remove the spring clip, loose it forever somewhere in the car the pull the shift knob off. Remove the tiny plastic piece on DS near "P" and use something thin and long (most screwdrivers won't fit) to push down the interlock and put the shifter down in D for space. There is one screw at the front, then the shifter surround and ashtray lift up. There are 3 or 4 plugs underneath and it is off. Next is the rear cover of the centre console; you need to open the console lid, pop off the trim covering the lid hinge and undo the 2rd screw from the driver's side (the rest all need to come out later so you can do them all now and remove the lid) Then the rear cover unclips (6 clips), start at the top with a trim tool pulling backwards. Once it is off there are 2 screws facing rearwards to remove (need a short phillips for these) and you are done with the rear of the console. There are 4 plugs at the A/V box to unclip Then there are 2 screws at the front of the console, and 2 clips (pull up and back) and the console will come out.
×
×
  • Create New...