Tiny ODBII Engines
 

Last summer I looked into what it would take to make a go-kart street legal here in Vermont. The big stumbling block was the requirement for an ODBII engine. Anyone know of small ODBII engines? Thanks.

do you mean OBD2?

I think that the 3 cyl metro engine was made after 96 making it obd2 compliant. I had one but it was a 93. those things were 1 liter displacement. I think those are the smallest ones. I may be wrong.

Sorry, Roman numerals. 1 liter? That's pretty big for a go-kart! I pretty much figured it's unlikely that anything not in a production car would be equipped with ODB2 (better? hehe).

Why would a homemade car be required to have OBDII? Are you absolutely sure about that law?

Vermont doesn't seem to have any special provisions for homemade cars at all. I had an email conversation with someone at the DMV about it and everything. It was very disappointing.

A lot of quirky things here. They beefed up the septic system engineering requirements BEFORE updating the list of state approved systems a few years ago. Meant that a lot of properties were left with no way to install any form of septic system. Boneheaded.

AFAIK, OBDII is only required on mass-produced 1996+ cars. A homemade car should be exempt.

I mentioned that to the guy and he said it would include any home built as well. Maybe he just didn't know what he was talking about! That would be fantastic! I'll contact them again. I had all but given up on this project. Thanks for the hope!

I went here for my info last summer:

https://www.dmv.state.vt.us/INSPECTIO...Inspection.htm

Which vehicles will be required to be checked?

1996 and newer vehicles having a gross vehicle weight rating of 8,500 pounds or less must have their OBD systems checked.


The DMV worker I talked with interpretted that as ALL vehicles, including homemade. I'm going to search some more. I also emailed the federal ODB2 guys to see what they say about homemade vehicles. I have a hunch VT is just complying with federal mandates.

Just re-read the VT inspection manual and it doesn't have anything in it exempting homemade cars. I'll wait on the feds and then go to the DMV with what they say.

VT's definition of a moped requires that it have pedals, even though the pedals are geared such that it's only good for starting! This means that scooters, even if they obey all the other requirements are not counted as mopeds here. Some people register their scooters via mail to circumvent this.