Season 2, Episode 52 - Cummins Fined and Insight Behind It

 

 

The following transcription of The Truck Show Podcast was generated using a speech recognition software, and will contain errors. Please review the timestamp and listen to the corresponding audio for accuracy. 

Quick Link to Previous Episodes

 

Sean P. Holman (1s):

Hello Truck Show Podcast listeners. This episode was originally intended to be released on Monday, January 8th, but due to the timeliness of the content, we decided to debut it early. Our next show, the first Thursday short form episode of 2024, will be released on the regularly scheduled date of Thursday, January 11th. Thank you for listening to The Truck Show Podcast, and enjoy the show.

1 (21s):

And now our feature presentation.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (26s):

Happy 2024. Ladies and Gentlemen’s truck. Show Podcast. My name is Lightning. He’s Holman. What are you eating over there? That’s looks like a popcorn. Zebra Popcorn.

Sean P. Holman (34s):

Zebra Popcorn from Popcorn Opolis. My, my wife took her Costco gift card and rated Costco. She sends me a picture a little while ago.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (42s):

Oh my God. That’s

Sean P. Holman (42s):

Good. It says, this is my impulse buy. And then about five minutes ago, she got home and I went into find Lightning some, some sugar And. she goes, well just take this bag out there. And I’m like, this might be overkill. She goes, yeah, don don’t really want it in the house. Just take it. Dude. That is crack

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (57s):

Dude. It is, oh my. Holy mackerel. That is good. That’s

Sean P. Holman (1m 0s):

So sweet. My teeth are hurting.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (1m 2s):

Wow. All right on this truck. Show Podcast. We are,

Sean P. Holman (1m 5s):

You get to guess. Say what you get to guess.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (1m 8s):

Get we get to guess who’s on the show.

Sean P. Holman (1m 10s):

They get to guess how much weight the two of us gained over the holidays. No,

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (1m 14s):

On this episode alone, Oh my

Sean P. Holman (1m 16s):

God. I got Dr. Pepper. I got Oh, Hold on checking in with my diabetes

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (1m 21s):

On this episode of The Truck. Show Podcast kicking off the year. We’re just going to eat. So it’s gonna be like all the other years. so we, like you are very curious about what is up with Cummins having to pay the government $1.67 billion

Sean P. Holman (1m 41s):

Sex, what a million trucks with

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (1m 43s):

A B. That’s a $1.67 billion

Sean P. Holman (1m 46s):

The last 10 years of, of Ram HD production. So somewhere around a million trucks. so we decided that we were gonna kick off the new year by getting educational. so we figured we would call our good friend Kory Willis from PPEI, who is no stranger to the EPA and fines. And then we also figured we would call Peter trite over at SEMA Garage’s Emissions Lab to kind of fill us in on his perspective and, and what they see when it comes to testing new vehicles and making aftermarket parts. And also wanted to kick off. This is the first episode of 2024, but it Will not be the only episode this week because starting this week, The Truck, Show Podcast is going to two episodes a week, one long form, which is this one, our normal interview and kind of the rest of the show.

Sean P. Holman (2m 32s):

And then a short form. Have you heard episode that’ll drop on Thursdays and that’ll be about a 15, 20 minute episode. We promise.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (2m 41s):

Why would you lie right to their ears? Well,

Sean P. Holman (2m 42s):

I, because I feel like I’m not lying right now. I feel like what I, I believe in what I’m saying. Okay. So

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (2m 47s):

Before

Sean P. Holman (2m 48s):

We get into the first of our two episodes this week, we have to thank of course Nissan are presenting sponsors. They’ve been with us since the beginning. If you’re in the market for a new truck, head on down to your local Nissan dealership where you can check out the Titan. The Titan Titan xd or the hot selling Mid-size Nissan Frontier, which I’ve been driving for the past month. I

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (3m 5s):

Noticed the tires are particularly muddy.

Sean P. Holman (3m 7s):

It definitely went off road. And I just, I love that truck. I, I, I know Nissan supports the show and they’re like, Hey, here’s the frontier. Drive it for a while. Talk about it on the show. It’s so comfortable. It’s the right size. It’s so easy to drive around town, yet you can still tow a decent sized trailer. Throw a payload in the back. How

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (3m 23s):

Does it feel? It feels great. No, no. I mean like, does it feel, does it feel heavy, solid? It

Sean P. Holman (3m 27s):

So nimble? No, it’s just, it feels solid. Okay. It’s just a solid truck. There’s no creeks, there’s no rattles. It, it’s got all the things you want. Nothing you don’t. We’ve driven on family trips to, you know, Mother-in-Law’s house, things like that with all four of us in there. No problems at all. Everybody had enough room, everybody was comfortable. And I’m like, You know what? I miss having a mid-size truck. I’ve had so many full-size trucks. I’m like, this thing’s just like the perfect truck. So if you are looking for the perfect truck, you can go to Nissan usa.com where you can use the build and price tool and you can see what options and what features you can get on your future Nissan pickup. And

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (3m 59s):

If you’re looking for the perfect driving experience out of your truck or car that’s feeling sluggish, you push the pedal down and you can count to 10 before something actually happens. You need to go to Banks Power dot com, type in your year, make and model, and find the pedal monster throttle controller that’s right for your car or truck. It gets rid of the throttle latency and makes it feel sporty. Again, it’s all sorts of patented safety features that blow away the competition. If you’ve seen any of the throttle controllers on Facebook or Instagram or wherever else, they are literally junk and dangerous by comparison. Put the excitement back in your car truck safely by heading over to Banks Power dot com to find your pedal monster.

Sean P. Holman (4m 39s):

Before we get into the jingle, I know you had a really good experience with a recent guest we just had on Miles from Kin. Apparently Daddy Warbuck over here purchased his kid a full interior for a Scion tc. What’s up with that?

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (4m 52s):

I may have. And what I didn’t expect is when they came to the house by the I, we, we did their pilot program. Okay. Where they came, I don’t know if it’s all areas. Yeah. But they, in the Long Beach area where I’m at, they had a dude, he came over in a cat scan truck and I wasn’t there. The wife’s like, why is there a big truck with a cow on the side? I’m like, like, go get it. The cow in the leather So I explained it to her. Did

Sean P. Holman (5m 10s):

She think that was for her Porsche?

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (5m 11s):

No, that came with leather. Oh, you found out about that.

Sean P. Holman (5m 15s):

Moving right along.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (5m 16s):

Okay. So anyway, so the wife went out there, greeted ’em. They, they, they gutted the car. They put all the amazing leather in So I. I was, it’s absolutely incredible. I, I just shout out to Cats Skin for making amazing products and making my 18 year old’s Christmas really

Sean P. Holman (5m 29s):

Rad. It’s gonna suck when somebody thinks this car is too nice and steals it right off your street in Long Beach, California.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (5m 35s):

How How dare you.

3 (5m 38s):

The truck show. We’re gonna show you what we know. We’re gonna answer What? The truck, because truck rides with the truck show. We have the lifted, we have the lowered and everything in between. We’ll talk about trucks that run on Diesel and the ones that run on gasoline. The truck show. The truck show. The truck show. Oh, whoa.

4 (6m 9s):

It’s the truck show with your hosts Lightning and Holman.

Sean P. Holman (6m 14s):

Yes. It is, and we are back after the first time taking a week off in over a year.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (6m 23s):

Did we take a year off? I’m sorry. Did we take a week off last year?

Sean P. Holman (6m 27s):

I don’t remember. Mm.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (6m 29s):

I Think we should, should have. I think that in six years we’ve only taken like three weeks off.

Sean P. Holman (6m 33s):

We have something like that.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (6m 34s):

We are just idiots. Yeah.

Sean P. Holman (6m 36s):

Yeah. Well, we tried to front load it and we, we threw a bunch of social out to remind you of all the cool episodes we had at the end of the year. So hopefully you guys found that helpful in finding shows and things like that. Got a lot going on this year. Again, we got the two episodes. We’re gonna try and build out our affiliate page online in our event. so we definitely thank everybody who sent in events for events. Oh yeah.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (6m 57s):

You guys got wild and you sent us a bunch. Just like, so keep that up. It was like a flurry over the holidays. Okay. We,

Sean P. Holman (7m 1s):

We wanna be the destination for, for truck events. So, so keep those coming our way. All. right? Big news happened over Christmas break and that was the breaking news that the EPA and DOJ was going after Cummins for quote unquote defeat device and cheating emissions where Cummins said, Hey, we are in negotiations to pay this fine. Well let me, lemme, we’re not gonna eliminate wrongdoing. And you know, you see those, you know, press releases coming out all the time and they’re like, government levies fine. And, and corporation says, well, we admit no wrongdoing, but we’ll pay you the fine. You kind of think like, what’s up with that? so we got a couple people that we invited on the show today, and they’re gonna help kind of give us their insight and their thoughts on it.

Sean P. Holman (7m 42s):

And first person we’re gonna call is our friend Kory Willis from PPEI

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (7m 46s):

All. right? I am dialing Mr. Kory Willis.

5 (7m 54s):

Hello?

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (7m 55s):

Is this He-Man, hunk of the earth. Cory Willis recently felt lost a, lost a bunch of weight and looks attractive these

Sean P. Holman (8m 2s):

Days. He-Man, hunk of the

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (8m 3s):

Earth. Wow.

5 (8m 7s):

Damn

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (8m 7s):

Man.

5 (8m 7s):

I have not, I haven’t heard it described like that, but I’ll I mean he’s gonna take

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (8m 12s):

It. Well, before we get into it and, and talk to Kory, I have a quote really quick here. Kory was talking to one of his, one of his fans here. Before you do that,

Sean P. Holman (8m 19s):

Would you say that he is he is Adonis level yet? Has he achieved that?

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (8m 23s):

I think he’s, I think he’s too short for Adonis. Oh, do you?

Sean P. Holman (8m 26s):

Okay. Okay.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (8m 27s):

I don’t think he’s ever endless is gonna go to some, like you think like, like really tall shoes. He’s like a a,

Sean P. Holman (8m 31s):

A mid-tier guy, but like the top of the tier in, in male Beauty, is that what you’re saying? Like top of the middle Bronx?

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (8m 38s):

I think I’m gonna say he’s a, he’s like a, he’s like a eight and three quarters outta 10. Would you call him

Sean P. Holman (8m 43s):

A gorgeous man?

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (8m 45s):

I might

5 (8m 47s):

Watch. I watched this, I watched this short, I think it was like Justin Waller or something like that. And he is like, look, you can be ugly. However, if you have expect your chances of being more attractive are that much higher. So I just went ahead and took that route.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (9m 2s):

So this guy on Mark is chatting with Kory online and he says, Kory, it’s nice to know that we all have a Gale Banks twin around in this world for now and the future. I think it’s awesome. He quoted well, a lot of flourish on that. Yeah, he’s, he’s looking at Kory Kory as the next Mark. Mark Gentle, whoever. Mark Gentle is gentle. Gentile. Gentle. Okay. Does he think that Corey’s dreamy? Is that where this is coming from? He have stars and hearts in his eyes. I think that Cory’s dreamy. Oh you think, okay. Got it. But Mark just thinks he’s the next scale. Banks. All. right? All right. which is a huge compliment I think. Right? This is the

5 (9m 35s):

Most, that’s a great compliment. This

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (9m 36s):

Is the most awkward start to, I’ve

5 (9m 38s):

Seen Gale’s, I’ve seen Gale’s shoe size and I’m telling you right now, I can’t, I can’t feel that shoe. He wears massive

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (9m 44s):

Shoes. You can’t unsee the man’s shoe size All. right? We have a quick intro play.

5 (9m 48s):

I mean it’s quite impressive. Oh, here

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (9m 49s):

We go. Here

4 (9m 50s):

We go. Truck Famous, hero star, VIP, ACE, big weight, hot shot truck, famous Seek shot, big deal. Big Gun, big cheese, heavyweight superstar Truck Famous. That’s what you are.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (10m 5s):

Truck famous All, right? Mr.

5 (10m 7s):

That’s of eighties part up and stuff. Which one of you don’t act like y’all didn’t have that conversation before? Like, hey, does it kind of sound like No, no man. No, it’s good. It’s good. They won me that. Somebody

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (10m 19s):

That may have mentioned Brown Chicken Brown Cow at some point. That’s all I say.

5 (10m 24s):

Oh, it’s good. It’s good. Nice to talk to y’all again.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (10m 26s):

All. right? So Kory, we’re talking about Dieselgate, the modern day Dieselgate not the one that happened with Volkswagen or the one that happened with Ram trucks and the Eco Diesel some time ago, back when it was that 15, 16, somewhere in that era. But now $1.67 billion fine to Cummins specifically for Clean Air Act violations. But the weird part is that no one really knows what happened or how they violated the Clean Air Act and all the, the CEO says is that we can’t find any wrongdoing. What say you

5 (11m 4s):

Well I mean I don’t think any of us really have any of the facts yet. A few folks that I know that I would, I would thought would have the facts that those guys actually don’t even know So it. You know, it’s really hard to say what the cause is, but one thing I know we can say is that the EPA will call pretty much any, they’ve expanded the language of defeat device to further than what people think of. Right? So a lot of folks think defeat device means that it’s actually like a physical device of some sort, but you can alter timing in the tuning file in such a way that doesn’t satisfy the emissions. And they would still classify in that small change a defeat device. Hmm. So they’re basically calling anything that doesn’t pass emissions or, or anything, even a change within the calibration that doesn’t pass emissions a defeat device.

5 (11m 54s):

The, the only thing that’s weird to me is, is you know, I look at data logs every single day. I see the nos, I see the, the, I see the, the, the so accumulation, I see the overall operation of the vehicle easily on just a Cummins, a minimum of 20, 20 plus times a day, very minimum. So when I see these things, I have to personally, you know, look and make sure everything’s in order to try to help diagnose whatever issue are if the truck’s sound, you know, sometimes people pay us just to look at a day log of their truck to see if it looks good and it’s like, yeah, looks good. Or Oh, no, Knox is reading a little bit high right here. But we can do that off of an average of the amount of volume that we see all the time. So what strikes me more than anything is if suddenly there was a defeat device or, or unless it was from day one, which I don’t think is necessarily possible because you know, I’m past carbon emissions with this stuff as well.

5 (12m 46s):

I haven’t seen any change. So that’s where I’m very curious of what they’re calling a defeat device. And I think it’s interesting that Cummins actually doesn’t admit any wrongdoing and basically is holding their ground of we don’t Think, we necessarily did anything wrong, but we’re gonna settle this.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (13m 4s):

So this affects 2013 to 2023 Cummins, 6.7 liter diesels. It’s important to note that this particular engine started back in oh seven and a half for And. It’ll put into RAM trucks as you know, but it’s very specific to this generation 13 to 23 and to affect all of them. I can’t wrap my head around that. It’s,

Sean P. Holman (13m 27s):

Well then walk me through this So I I’ve heard, and I don’t know, but it sounds like during Covid there was a sensor that was either removed or wasn’t available. So they tried to put the sensor’s job into the ECM to use the other sensors to kind of calculate the emissions output and adjust from there. But didn’t, there wasn’t some sort of like a dispensation or something from the government saying, yes, this is okay for you to do and, and now they’re going back and saying maybe that thing’s not okay or we just, we just don’t know what we don’t know yet. Yeah,

5 (14m 2s):

We kind of don’t know. We don’t know yet. But you know, the only thing you know, and and my opinion, you know, is It is It, is it worth a ton? Right? Because I mean we, none of us really know what’s going on. But You know what I can come from is if, if there was something that changed or something weird between those models or Cummins update, if the software to, to inhibit something I mean. I just, I, I just, I would’ve seen this, you know, it, it’s not like really a guess to me. It’s like, okay, well then the only change that we had between these years whatsoever was whenever this particulate matter sensor, the PM sensor deal came out. And I remember that this was an issue for me because I had a, I think Milliken had the same error where a readiness monitor wasn’t setting and So I wass.

5 (14m 48s):

Like why is this readiness monitor not setting like So I take and I send a stock file for that truck and the readiness monitor still doesn’t set. And so we do a good bit more digging and I find out that there was a file that Cummins had that they were using And, it had approval and all this stuff that works. So it’s like, okay, so we use the OEM file that they had and it’s like now that it was okay that the monitor wasn’t setting, but whenever I looked in the file, ’cause I was curious, it’s like, how does this work? And you can see that they basically just modeled it, which is nothing wrong with that. Like that’s a lot of manufacturers do that.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (15m 27s):

Let’s explain what you’re talking about. So you need to get your truck smugged in, in many states. Right. And in order to do that, these monitors, multiple monitors in the ECM, they’re checking various things and your truck will not pass a smog check or it’s not even ready for a smog check until these monitors are online ready to go online. Thumbs up. You guys have probably as listeners gone into a smog shop and the guy says, ah, your monitors aren’t ready. You need to go put 500 miles on the truck and come back. Right. That’s what we’re talking about with these monitors. So because this particulate matter sensor wasn’t available during COD, they basically bypassed the physical sensor and then just modeled what the sensor would do in the ECM kind of wrote an algorithm.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (16m 12s):

Yeah. And then it was kind of a fake sensor. Is that a good description? Oh,

Sean P. Holman (16m 15s):

I would call it a fake sensor. I would call it a virtual sensor.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (16m 18s):

Virtual sensor. The better description. Is that correct? Correct.

5 (16m 20s):

Virtual sensor. Nailed it. Yeah, you’re that’s exactly accurate. And the thing to me though is just between the trucks that would have it or wouldn’t have it, like all of my data looked the same. Like, this thing works perfectly fine. So, I, I don’t know the situation that happened, but you know, I, I couldn’t have, I wouldn’t have put it past someone with one of these, these setups would’ve went and tried to get the truck sped And it not work, and then that specific vehicle end up having X amount more output than another one. But it was probably still within the range. But that would be enough for the EPA to be able to come back around, trigger it and say, Hey, y’all have a problem.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (16m 58s):

But again, that was, that’s a covid though that this happened during Covid and they’re saying engines back to 2013 were defeating the emissions. So that,

Sean P. Holman (17m 6s):

So what makes me wonder is are they moving the Gulf Coast? Are they going back in time and going, well what we really meant by that language back there is this, so now we’re gonna go find these companies who maybe met the standard back then, but the language has changed, which seems, you know, pretty lame to me. Or

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (17m 23s):

Was there a standard that Cummins was supposed to meet back in 2013 that they never did and maybe promised? Or is there any documentation? I mean you would have to have the baseline file or I guess the SEMA LA or any of these laboratories to do emissions testing would have to have what the EPA says was the max knocks output, max particulate, et cetera. Right. That would be public, correct. Kory. Correct.

5 (17m 50s):

And we’ve used that and we’ve met ’em and like whenever I look at data logs, like they’ve been within it and let’s say, so I’ve thought about the angle you just came from and the, the only thing that, you know, devil advocates on it was, well, if they had an agreement in 13 or they had had an earlier agreement to get somewhere, well then surely they would’ve done it on the new, the new models. You know, like there’s it’s Cummins, they’re, they’re, they’re on a different level. Hmm. So it’s like if there was something to meet, they they would’ve met it.

Sean P. Holman (18m 19s):

Yeah. I can’t imagine that they, there would be, you know, Bob left his job and they hadn’t filled it for six months and that six months was the transition time and Sally came in there or something like that and was like, oh guys, we forgot to re-up with the government on this really important emissions, you know, certification for don don’t

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (18m 35s):

Know, seven years ago. Seven.

Sean P. Holman (18m 37s):

Yeah. Whatever the millions of of engines that we’ve put out are,

5 (18m 39s):

Whatever. And you know, if we go back in history, like Cummins was fine for emissions in 1998 and then I think in 2010 they were, they were fined again. So who knows, maybe they just want to go like, you know, 12 or 15 years and just catch fines.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (18m 53s):

Now, co Kory, is it true that there are different emissions groups? So for example, you might have a Cummins back that was released in 2013, but then in 2019 the rules change. EPA gets a little tighter and they say you can have less knocks and less pollutants coming outta the tailpipe. And so these vehicles released in that year range get a more stricter emissions code and then a few years later it happens again and, and again, first, is that true? And if so, that would’ve caught it at some point, right?

5 (19m 22s):

Correct. Yeah. That would’ve caught it. And then on top of that, it’s not just Cummins doing emissions testing on these things. You know, with, with certified labs, I mean there’s tons of companies that even not a t there’s tons of tuning companies, there’s tons of, of military operations. There’s tons of stuff that people are doing upfitting on and then having to do testing again. And I talk to a lot of these folks and no one’s seen any issues. So that’s where it’s kind of mind boggling was for them to catch something that’s wrong. Then some one of us in the industry should have failed a test at carbs So. it was carbs testing actually what’s at fault because we’ve passed them and so have many others with stuff that I, I would assume if they’re charging for all these year models, I mean I mean the initial testing the car would’ve had to been wrong.

5 (20m 12s):

What was, that’s, that’s where I’m kind of stuck is, you know, did Cummins do anything wrong? And did the EPA set up a, a test designed to fail worse than what it would’ve been? I wouldn’t put that through the realm of possibility because that’s what they did by using the six four Diesel from the Spartan Technologies truck that they use now as a baseline of how bad all deleted vehicles are. There was zero variables and that was a worst case scenario truck. Now granted none of ’em is gonna pass, but they used one that was So far out of the realm of reality that it makes all the other testing looked terrible without any variables associated. So I think, what I would like to know is, is what was the defeat device?

5 (20m 56s):

I don’t think there was one. I personally am taking the stance that I don’t think Cummins did anything wrong. If they did, they did it not knowingly and the EPA or someone changed the goalpost or change the language of something. ’cause they are very consistent at changing their interpretation of what laws and language are. They just keep expanding it.

Sean P. Holman (21m 16s):

Well, and I I would say the current administration seems to have, you know, be a dog with a bone, let’s say when it comes to anything quote unquote green or whatever their, you know, progressive agenda is on, on climate change and things like that. So to me it doesn’t sound like it’s out of the, the, you know, realm of possibility that the goalpost was moved or they’re reinterpreting language that was already out there and need to fund something. So they’re like, well, hey, we need some money. Let’s go find some people to fund. Oh well we got this gray area here in, in in this legislation. Let’s let’s enforce it to the full extent of it and go after some people. You know, I just, it it’s crazy.

5 (21m 55s):

There’s just, it wouldn’t surprise me. And I think it’s interesting too, a company, you know, I’m not gonna get on a a a, sorry me post here, but you know, the amount that Cummins got fined was, was quite dramatic. I I do agree. But when you, when you compare that to what Cummins annual revenue is, I think 33 billion Yeah. Versus what the actual fine amount was. Compare that to my annual revenue Yeah. Versus what my fine amount was. I I did, you know, they, they made a said 185,000 trucks for me and my annual revenue was less, but my fine amount by percentage was higher than theirs with less trucks. It is just, they’re inconsistent. There’s no oversight at the EPA. And what I’m learning is, as well and, and kind of firsthand experience, there’s actually a large disconnect between the, some of the lead engineers at the EPAs agenda, like to do their jobs properly with all the variables factored verse what the Department of Justice Yeah.

5 (22m 51s):

Is there is a very large disconnect in there. And you know, I don don’t want to say that the EPA is a weaponized organization for the Department of Justice, but the collection amounts go into the Department of Justice. Hmm. So, I think personally that we’re gonna see this was just the start. I Think this is gonna be a snowball effect. And I think they’re going after, I think they’re going after diesels in general. Yeah. I mean they, to try to push the green agenda. They’ve already, I don’t think Cummins did anything wrong.

Sean P. Holman (23m 20s):

They’ve already gone after the 15 hundreds. There’s almost nothing left except for the three liter in the, in the GMs. Now I’ve heard a rumor that I don’t necessarily subscribe to that Ford is bringing a version of the lion out for the F-150. Again, I don’t think that’s the case, but who knows, for all intents and purposes, light duty Diesel, you know, under 88 a hundred GVWR dead in America with a couple exceptions mentioned here in a second ago. But I think they wanna go after heavy duties. Next I mean This is the natural progression of pushing that out. I really think that yes, that your comment about snowballing to affect, but they also have to be careful because a lot of those, like we talked about before you came on the call, a lot of those manufacturers are providing military and industrial and power for, you know, infrastructure and all, all that kind of stuff.

Sean P. Holman (24m 13s):

So like, they have to be really careful because if they kill off that industry, they actually hurt themselves in some of the agenda building that they wanna do. So, ’cause it’s, it’s not like that mine that’s being, you know, stripped for rare earth minerals is doing it with electric tractors right now. Right. I mean you have to still have Diesel moves the world, whether it’s a, a, a train, a boat, a agriculture, whatever, you know, as, as these other technologies come online, we’re still 10, 15, 20 years away and I think they want to kill off the Diesel faster than they have a

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (24m 45s):

No replacement.

Sean P. Holman (24m 46s):

A replacement. Yeah. Yeah. That technology ready to go

5 (24m 49s):

For what the EPA is saying, the amount of deleted trucks in America is. Right. Whenever on my paperwork they had showed me 500,000 with their estimation of deleted vehicles in America, which I I think they’re highly underestimating that, but

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (25m 3s):

How many, if you had to guess, wait, Hold on Kory, how do you think there’s over a million emissions defeated consumer vehicles on the road?

5 (25m 12s):

I would be willing to say over just the past probably three years, there’s probably at least half a million on the road and all the calibrations for the most part came outta Russia and China because there’s no one in America doing it anymore. So everyone’s basically getting a calibrations outta Russia and China off of these websites and then they turn around and they’ll hook up with a company in Canada and just sell it outta Canada. But it’s not originating in Canada. Now there, there’s probably a couple of very, very extremely rare exceptions, but I’d say 95% of everything I’ve seen is pretty much the same files, same stuff. And it’s coming outta Russia and China. And so to make matters even worse, it’s cheaper in, in most cases now, now not what you see on Facebook and whatnot.

5 (25m 59s):

But what we, we see people saying is, you know, well I bought it off of that website for 300 bucks and did it in my garage, And, it was $800 said and done. What people have learned as well is, hey, I have access to the same rather stolen or it’s hacked or what, or it’s, or it’s built out of those countries. I can go and find this on Amazon or I can find it wherever, download it off of a backwoods website and hey, I got everything everybody else has. So I’ve seen that type of stuff spread like wildfire. Now it actually benefits us because if people don’t know what they’re doing with the files and they send it to the wrong truck, then you know, it has issues. So it’s a guessing game and that makes it bad and makes it more unreliable.

5 (26m 40s):

But at the end of the day, the volume’s there, people are knocking it out the park and the only thing that’s happened is now there’s no tax revenue in America and the files are coming from out the country. So yeah, government might come in with good intentions, but I think historically proven generally government has an opposite effect of the what, what they generally are trying to accomplish.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (26m 60s):

Yeah. I mean, look, the, the harder they fight the drug war, the more drugs come

Sean P. Holman (27m 3s):

In. Well, they’re not fighting it or very hard I mean

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (27m 6s):

Well they in the eighties and all that, you know, like when we were kids

Sean P. Holman (27m 9s):

Yeah. I mean consumer facing. Sure.

5 (27m 12s):

Yeah. And so the FDA can get their hands on it and then legalize it for their own purposes. Agreed.

Sean P. Holman (27m 17s):

I mean we could

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (27m 18s):

Don’t All. right. Let, we can

Sean P. Holman (27m 20s):

Easily put on our tinfoil hats here and go down the rabbit hole. Right, right. By the way, that’s gonna be my new podcast in 2024. It’s just gonna be called the Tinfoil Hat chat and it’s just gonna be me and a bunch of friends with voice changers. God just espousing all sorts of rando stuff.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (27m 37s):

Tin foil hat chat. So attorney general Merrick b Garland sums up Can.

Sean P. Holman (27m 42s):

You boo him really quick boo

5 (27m 44s):

Super, super incompetent

Sean P. Holman (27m 45s):

All. right,

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (27m 46s):

Thank you. Violations of our environmental laws have a tangible impact. They inflict real harm on people in communities across the country. This historic agreement should make clear that the Justice Department will be aggressive in its efforts to hold accountable those who seek to profit at the expense of other people’s health and safety.

Sean P. Holman (28m 7s):

And listen, I’m not saying that we don’t wanna be, you know, have clean air and all, we’ve said this a million times on the show, I want clean air and water like everybody else. But you can’t be like, oh, well that emissions goes away with carbon credits. Let’s just trade. Right. I mean like, it’s ridiculous. They, they aren’t really going after the things otherwise they would be going after a lot of other industries. ’cause the automotive industry is really clean. There’s a lot of other places where they could, they could make that up. So, I. I,

5 (28m 34s):

Well I mean you take a ship, a ship a a ship that’ll leave America, go to Africa, pick up the the minerals and bring them back. That one trip there and back, consume more fuel than what the EPA states all of these trucks combined do. So it’s like really, like they, they know this argument is just beyond weak.

Sean P. Holman (28m 59s):

Well, and then I, I read a story on a website called Transport in an Environment that said luxury cruises giant emits 10 times more air pollution than all of Europe’s cars. And there’s a study that said Carnival, which is the world’s largest luxury cruise operator, admitted nearly 10 times more sulfur oxide around European coasts than did all 260 million European cars in 2017. A new analysis by a sustainable transport group, transport and environmental reveals Royal Caribbean cruises. The world’s second largest is second yet four times worse than the European car fleet. SOX emissions form sulfate. So four aerosols that increase human health risk and contribute to acidification in terrestrial and aquatic environment. So I mean I listen, I’m not, it’s so hard because somebody’s gonna go, oh, you just hate the environment.

Sean P. Holman (29m 43s):

I’m like, no. But I also believe in industry. I also believe in freedom and there’s gotta be a balance. There’s a, there’s a middle ground there, right? Like I don’t want people like rolling coal. You go down the street, but

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (29m 52s):

They can’t stop trade, they can’t stop ships. It’s the only way that we’re getting all of our Chinese imports and everything else. Right. And we’re shipping out everything. They can’t do it and they won’t run on electricity. And they can’t run on solar. Yeah. There’s literally no other way to do it yet. And so they have to hope thing like it doesn’t happen. It

Sean P. Holman (30m 8s):

Runs on hope.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (30m 9s):

Hope

5 (30m 10s):

And, and like, one thing that we need to remember is, is that it was never, ever, ever the federal government’s responsibility to tell the rest of the United States how to live their lives. It’s the state’s responsibility to, to tell people what is allowed in their state. And then if you don’t like the laws of that state, then you go to another state where it works. So if one guy doesn’t like what’s going on over here, you can go to that other one. Yeah.

Sean P. Holman (30m 34s):

But Kory, can we, can we

5 (30m 35s):

Be honest for the federal government?

Sean P. Holman (30m 36s):

Can we be honest for a second here? I mean, dude. Yeah. Basically that’s backwards. ’cause all of us in California we’re like exporting people to kind of ruin your states and stuff. Just saying

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (30m 47s):

Not quarries yet. Not in Louisiana yet. It’s not got, yeah, it gets

Sean P. Holman (30m 51s):

Close. It’s in Texas.

5 (30m 52s):

Yeah. I think don don’t know. I’ll have to see how all that plays out. ’cause like, you know, for example, during co like, like during Covid, you know, with all the restrictions and everything else in Louisiana, like at least where I’m at, if you followed all the restrictions, no one went in your store. Like you’re, you’re not gonna have any business. No one’s going in there. Yeah. So what do you do? You know, likewise, one of the, whenever the bars closed down, they’d come back around and actually had people defend the bars to say, you can’t tell us that we can’t stop. You don’t see that on the news. But those things are happening out here. So, you know, with residents coming from other states to influence, you know, maybe some parts of states and cities will handle it. But, you know, I know where I’m at.

5 (31m 34s):

Like we, we straight up just wouldn’t tolerate it.

Sean P. Holman (31m 36s):

Just look up Huntington Beach, California where I hail from and I’m in a little, little enclave of freedom here in California and that’s beautiful out there. Yes. It is

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (31m 46s):

All. right? Cool.

5 (31m 46s):

You know, and and California’s awesome man. I I love California. It’s just, you know, the big city’s kind of got things weird. Yeah,

Sean P. Holman (31m 53s):

Dude, it’s amazing. Amazing scenery, amazing weather, amazing natural resources. Amazing natural. Do, do we

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (31m 58s):

Ever talk about this home and where, so the first time Kory was ever in California, he went to the Seima Laboratory where, where Peter trite runs. Right? The Seima garage, which by the way, we’re talking to Peter Ray after you. Anyway. So Kory comes into Azusa, which is where Banks is. Yeah. and I go. So how, how much of California have you seen? He goes, oh, nothing. This is my first trip. I go, wait, you’re seeing the armpit? Yeah. I mean It is not that big. Armpit, armpit It is, it’s an industrial area, right? It’s just industrial big, the nice part. Big mov industrial buildings. Right. And I said, so wait, you haven’t been to the beach yet? He goes, no, I gotta go home tomorrow this night. I said, no, you’re not. I called up my buddy Brad and you know, Brad, little bald Brad. And I called. I said, Brad, what are you doing this week? And he goes, I’m just hanging out. And he’s like the unofficial mayor of Hermosa Beach.

Sean P. Holman (32m 40s):

The other hb

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (32m 40s):

It’s true. The other hb. Exactly. And he’s this little bald guy that just walks in the back door of every bar on, you know, on Main Street, you know, on the pier and So I. I, I called Brad, I said, Hey, I’ve got a guy from out of town and he, you Can you hang out with him in schmooze. I’m dropping him off at your house. Brad’s got a, a

Sean P. Holman (32m 55s):

Rooftop. That’s hilarious. You’re like, I’m dropping a dude off. You just need to go. You know, take him around for a while. No,

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (32m 60s):

But Brad’s I knew Brad would be down for it. And he was So. So Corey’s supposed to fly out the next day. He extends his trip four more days. Nice. And he calls in his best friend, he flies in his buddy. So now this is three of him. And they’re like, I’m not gonna say they got hammered, but they were having fun.

Sean P. Holman (33m 15s):

Listen. so

5 (33m 17s):

We had a blast. Brad was fun.

Sean P. Holman (33m 19s):

SoCal where we live is probably one of the only places in the world you can surf in the morning and snowboard in the afternoon. I mean it’s, it’s literally that close. It’s,

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (33m 25s):

That’s, that’s Cory’s

Sean P. Holman (33m 26s):

Next trip. People don people don’t realize like how mountainous and flat it all is at the same time. I mean within two hours. You’re, you’ve seen Desert, mountains, beaches, everything. We, we, we we’re lucky we’re, we’re blessed. Maybe not by some of the rulemaking, but definitely from the location. I dunno if I ever told you this story. Oh, she’s awesome. My, my wife one day I I, we got a bunch of friends leaving ’cause every everybody lives here knows people who are leaving And. She’s kinda like, oh, you know, everybody’s leaving. Like, where would we go if we left? And I’m like, well I I think I’d like to do like something, you know, really red like Wyoming because I think they’re like 60 or 70% right? Like I’m gonna go hang out with those guys. She’s like, ah, but it snow’s there. I’m like, oh, alright. I’m like, you know Tennessee Kentucky’s kind of cool.

Sean P. Holman (34m 8s):

The Smoky Mountains really kinda love that, that part of the country. She goes, ah, they have freezing rainstorms and everybody’s moving there. The traffic’s getting worse. I’m like, yeah, you’re right. I go, well how about like the Gulf Coast? You know, you go Alabama or Florida Little muggy though. She’s like, oh, bugs, crocodiles, alligators, like a huge mosquitoes. I’m like, ah, okay, okay. I’m like, you know, well we could always do it. Everybody else is goes Arizona or Nevada. she goes Too hot, too hot. And I’m like, you’re basically telling me you wanna live someplace that has 70% humidity and 70% temperature year round. She goes, yeah. I go, we live there, we’re here now.

5 (34m 41s):

You can’t, you can’t replicate it. You Can you can’t

Sean P. Holman (34m 43s):

Replicate. It is, this is why we’re not leaving. That’s, anyway, it’s

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (34m 47s):

Amazing.

5 (34m 47s):

All, right? That’s yeah. I I fell in love with California. It is freaking nice. Alright,

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (34m 51s):

Kory, next time you’re on the show, we’re gonna talk PPEI, power Performance Enterprises Inc. So we’re gonna talk your, your new 50 State compliant tunes. That’s right. 50 state emissions compliant tunes. And we’ll talk about your side-by-side racing UTVs. don don’t think Holman knows that Cory Willis is now the fastest in the country, or second fastest, which is, it

5 (35m 11s):

Depends

Sean P. Holman (35m 12s):

If you believe It is Instagram or not, depends

5 (35m 13s):

What series you’re doing. Yeah, it would depend on what series. But for what it’s worth, like, I haven’t announced this yet, so This is the first anyone’s hearing yet, but Travis Pastrana and Nitro Cross are doing a thing in Vegas. They invited, I think it was 10 or 12 of the top racers in the country to do it. And it’s, it’s gonna be a very cool format. I don’t know what I can and can’t say, but it’s gonna be a very cool format. And I got invited, so well

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (35m 37s):

Don’t say it yet. We’ll do, we’ll talk about this on the future episode. We’ll, we’ll, we’ll get you back on. We to say is not he, he’s not a one trick pony with just Diesel

Sean P. Holman (35m 45s):

No All. right. And when, one last thing just because guys who have, who follow you or maybe follow you loosely through the The Truck Show Podcast, what is the latest with your deal? ’cause I know you still had a few kind of hurdles that you had to overcome before you truly kind of were able to exhale and, and have all this stuff behind you. What, what’s the status of, of your situation and your fight with the EPA?

5 (36m 6s):

Well, it’s, it’s not what it was. I could say that it’s, it’s not, I’m not being harassed and attacked and having to spend $50,000 a month on attorneys. So that’s kind of nice. Still got some hurdles and, and I’ll be honest, like at this point in time, I mean it’s, it’s, it’s just so political. So we’re, we’re playing a lot of politics. We got a lot of politicians involved and it’s Louisiana, the state of Louisiana’s now involved. It’s, it’s getting really, really, really weird. So I don’t know what’s become of it. I just know that I’m more than willing to walk around with the knives in my back just so people can absolutely see that they actually put knives in your back.

Sean P. Holman (36m 43s):

Well, and I’ll, I’ll I’ll say this,

5 (36m 45s):

We’ll see how long that lasts. You,

Sean P. Holman (36m 46s):

You have been incredibly transparent on your Facebook and social pages talking to people and you haven’t been afraid to still stand your ground and, and say what you think and exercise your first amendment right for where you think you were wronged and what you think is going on. And so a lot of people who aren’t you would have folded long ago and said, You know what? I’m just gonna keep my mouth shut. I want to go live my life and be left alone. And, and, and you fought every step of the way and you were transparent to show other people the battle that you’re going through. And I just wanted to say thank you because from the outsider looking in, you’re like, good for that dude. He, he’s standing up for his, his ideals, his convictions, and there he’s not gonna let them litigate him out of his belief system. So I appreciate you being honest and upfront with, with your audience.

5 (37m 28s):

Well thank you man. Yeah. I mean, I just think about the scenario of, you know, whenever my grand, you know, let’s say I have grandkids one day and you know, what’s the legacy of grandpa? Well I don’t want part of that legacy to be well I gave up that that can’t be part of the conversation. If I’m gonna leave a legacy that’s worth following. so we just do what we gotta do as men.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (37m 45s):

Yet he

Sean P. Holman (37m 46s):

Has a legacy with Brad and Hermosa Beach.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (37m 49s):

Yes, he did. Behind here in California. That’s awesome. We can’t talk about anything though.

Sean P. Holman (37m 54s):

No, no, no. That statute limitations are exactly

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (37m 57s):

All. right. Kory gotta go. Kory, Willis PPEI. We’ll talk soon. Thanks. Thanks brother.

5 (38m 1s):

Thank you All. right,

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (38m 4s):

So that was one perspective. Now it’s time to get another from Peter. Trite Peter has been on the show quite a few times. Peter is the compliance center manager for SEMA, the Specialty Equipment Market Association. He’s got an office up in Diamond Bar, California, somewhere between Huntington Beach and my office at Banks. And they do compliance testing. So if Holman decided he wanted to come out with a, an exhaust system for a vehicle and he wanted that to meet the California Air Resource Board compliance Peter would help him achieve that.

Sean P. Holman (38m 34s):

Go find Peter and say, Hey, help, help. Yeah, exactly. Exactly. But he, he’s probably the, the best resource as far as the industry goes for the aftermarket. And he works with obviously both the OE side ’cause he is gotta get baselines for all these vehicles and he works with the companies who wanna modify them. So, I think he really straddles that line and probably has the most visibility of anyone we know on both sides of the conversation. All,

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (38m 57s):

Right. It’s time to call Mr. Peter. Trite.

5 (39m 5s):

Hello

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (39m 6s):

Mr. Peter. Trite Lightning and Holman truck. Show Podcast. Long time.

Sean P. Holman (39m 9s):

How’s it going?

5 (39m 10s):

All, right? Holman, how you guys doing? Good to hear from you.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (39m 13s):

We’re doing better than the Diesel industry.

Sean P. Holman (39m 16s):

Yeah. Apparently

5 (39m 17s):

Things are shaken up a bit. It sounds like

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (39m 20s):

A little bit. Hey, before we get your perspective on this, we have a quick intro to play. Don’t move.

7 (39m 26s):

It’s time to contact. We Yes, it’s time to talk tech. We wanna get more, please help us understand more. We really want to know as much as we can about the subject matter at and we found a person who can help us understand the information because we don’t even have a clue that talk,

5 (39m 51s):

I’ll take that

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (39m 54s):

All. right. So Peter, you’re aware of the $1.67 billion fine that Cummins is has I think agreed to pay it. It looks don don’t know. I can’t, I can’t glean whether they’ve paid it. They’re going to pay, they’re gonna fight it. Yeah. I think

Sean P. Holman (40m 9s):

They agreed to accepted it, but with no fault or no responsibility of doing wrongdoing, I think is where it landed.

5 (40m 15s):

Yeah, and I, I think it the word something like they’ve, they’ve agreed in principle to pay. So you know, it, it’ll be interesting to see how that really shakes out, but it’s a big fine for sure.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (40m 27s):

It covers ram trucks with Cummins engines, the 6.7 liter Diesel from 2013 basically to current. Has there ever been a swath of vehicles that big all in violation of the Clean Air Act?

5 (40m 43s):

Yeah, I I, you know, I, the answer probably is no. But I think it’s also worth noting that those trucks remained fairly consistent through that range of years in terms of their hardware, particularly when you look at their emissions hardware. So, you know, the strategy are being used to control emissions throughout that span have reigned pretty consistent.

Sean P. Holman (41m 12s):

So the question that I Think we have, we had Kory Willis on to kind of give us a, a aftermarket tuning perspective of what he saw and he said, listen, I’ve been seeing these trucks in batches, literally 20 of them a day minimum. And I would’ve picked up on something. And I don’t think that Cummins necessarily did anything wrong. My concern is did they move the goalpost or reinterpret some language that was already on the books or an agreement didn’t get re-signed. Because it sounds like to us that the only major difference in emissions hardware is the PM sensor, which went to a virtual sensor during covid because of supply chain, which my understanding was okayed by the government for that to happen and that it’s pretty accurate.

Sean P. Holman (41m 53s):

Do you have any insight on, on any of that that you could add to the story?

5 (41m 58s):

Yeah, you know, it’s pretty interesting. I think most of what you’re, you’re SL on there Sean is, is probably stuff we’ll never hear. That’s, that’s where there’s a lot of kind of behind closed doors negotiations going on there. Well, I think what’s interesting in, in the language that, that has been released from the, the DOJ Department of Justice is there, there’s really two terms used here. One is defeat devices and the other is auxiliary emissions control devices. So I can talk a little bit about those if you like the term defeat device.

5 (42m 38s):

I think when, when that term is used, we often think about, you know, some type of a physical device. But the reality is that software is a device and there are, there are devices within the software, there are multiple devices within the software. There’s different ways to, to control different aspects of the emissions control system. This case, what they’re talking about is NOx high levels of NOx. I think that was the same thing that was going on in the Volkswagen scandal as well. And in quality, there’s, there’s two strategies that Cummins uses on these engines to control NOx. One is the EGR system, the other is the urea system or the, the selective catalyst reduction system.

5 (43m 28s):

And that’s the system where urea is injected to, to reduce NOx. And,

Sean P. Holman (43m 33s):

And real quick reminding listeners that Cummins and RAM were the last of the party outta the heavy duty trucks to go to deaf, deaf and, and SER, right?

5 (43m 43s):

That’s correct. So they, they started that in 2013, interestingly, and the reason that they came later was because they were using a different strategy early on, which I think is, is very novel and, and worth, worth noting. They were using a NOx trap methodology. In other words, they had a component or a set of components, exhaust systems that in the exhaust system that would hold the NOx and then process as he was generated and different things were happening in the exhaust system. I think that was a problem approach. I think they, they struggled with it a little bit. I i, I don’t know the inside scoop on that, but I think that that was one of the reasons we ultimately made the switch.

5 (44m 27s):

But you’re right that, you know, they were definitely later to use the selective catalyst system. Interestingly, they were using the NOx trap as far back as 2 0 7. And there’s some advantages to That. one of the things that we know about NOx is NOx is created when your cylinder temperatures or your combustion temperature high. So if you can, if you can treat the NOx after the fact with a NOx trap, you have the opportunity to potentially make more boost and therefore make more power. I think that Cummins was, was probably using that strategy early on as a means to, you know, kind of take a, take a bit of a lead in the, in the horsepower and tort game.

5 (45m 13s):

But ultimately I think they, they found a need that to, to make the switch because they couldn’t work with that system in, in such a way to, to kind of keep, keep that ball rolling.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (45m 23s):

Peter, one second here. Let’s remind people what NOX is. I don’t want the gas guys to get confused and think it’s like a knock

Sean P. Holman (45m 31s):

Oxides of nitrogen. Yeah, right. Okay. Particular

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (45m 33s):

You can. Yeah, good point. And and why does, why, why does big brother hate it?

5 (45m 38s):

So oxides of nitrogen is, is, you know, the term NOx is, is an abbreviation for oxides of nitrogen. It generally includes primarily nno No and NO two. And these are the smog forming components here in Southern, California. We know that all too well. Right. You know, we, we all grew up with, with smog, we know what what that is and we’ve seen significant in that. And that’s primarily because the automakers have been pressed to reduce the, the NOx output from, from vehicles. Now in a Diesel, well really in any forced induction application, NOx is, is a challenge because when you’re using forced induction, you have higher cylinder pressures.

5 (46m 23s):

We, we know that when we compress air and when the cylinder is compressing that air, you’re gonna get higher temperatures and that’s gonna result in NOx. So forced induction and of course are king of forced induction. That’s when, that’s when we see the struggles with, with controlling NOx. So coming back to the terminology that’s being used here, when we talk about defeat devices, I don’t think I’m, I’m, I’m very confident that we’re not talking about some mechanism that, that yeah, Cumins installed on these

Sean P. Holman (46m 54s):

Engines. They, they didn’t hang a widget off of it and, and go, Ooh, we’re gonna have this little box hanging off the engine that’s magically right going to trick everything. That’s not, that’s not what we’re talking about here.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (47m 5s):

And they didn’t do what Volkswagen did, which I thought was what Volkswagen vehicles knew when they were on the dyno, when they were chassis dyno. Yeah. And they said, oh wait, only the front wheels are spinning. ’cause the front Wheel drive car, the back wheels aren’t spinning. That tells the ECM that it’s on a, on a dyno and to access a different tune file, like a cleaner tune file than it would on the road.

5 (47m 26s):

So now you’re getting into some interesting territory because the reality of emissions testing is that it, the, the tests that, that the OEMs are subject to and the aftermarket, by the way, those tests are very particular. They exercise the vehicle in a very particular way. And the vehicle, we all know that the vehicle operates outside of those ranges in real world conditions. The carb knows that EPA knows that. And because of that, the OEMs are required to disclose certain things about how that vehicle will operate under conditions that are outside of the emissions drive traces.

5 (48m 11s):

And that’s where this term auxiliary emissions control devices comes into play. So this is a term that’s actually very well known within emissions circles. We, we commonly use the, the acronym A ECD to describe these auxiliary emissions control devices. But basically all of the OEMs include some number of auxiliary emissions control devices in their vehicles, in their software, even in hardware. And these, these are strategies that are used to protect components under adverse conditions. And the most obvious one that I can, that I can describe to you is the use of gasoline to cool a catalytic converter when it gets hot.

5 (49m 2s):

So in, in pretty much every gasoline vehicle that’s on the road, the air fuel ratio will drop to a richer mixture under heavy load conditions in order to protect the catalyst from literally melting down. And that is an auxiliary emissions control device or an A ECD In this case, it appears that there were some, a CDs that were being employed that were undisclosed to carbon EPA. So the way I interpret that is the Cummins engineers were doing their job. They were, they were putting the effort in to ensure that the DPF and the catalysts were all protected under, you know, certain operating conditions.

5 (49m 46s):

But in doing so, either the paperwork didn’t get done or, you know, somehow or another, it wasn’t disclosed to, to the agencies. And as a result, they’re now suffering the consequences of

Sean P. Holman (49m 58s):

That. To me it it, it goes back to the ideology or the want might outrun the technology a little bit for what the consumer demand of performance is.

5 (50m 9s):

Think about the horsepower battles and the torque battles that the, that these, you know, that the big three are in. You know, they’re, they’re constantly trying to one up each other. And in order to do that, you gotta have, you gotta have fuel, you gotta have boost, you gotta have, but you’ve gotta control the emissions at the same time. So and so at the same time that you’re trying to get more power and torque out of the engine the emission standards are progressively getting tighter. And you know, we know we, you know, we’ve seen it when we do emissions work in our laboratory, we see, you know, we’re, we’re, we’re seeing those standards get tighter and tighter year after year.

5 (50m 49s):

And it’s amazing what the OEMs are capable of with the, the equipment that they have to work with. So, you know, it’s impressive. And, and Cummins made the statement that they are not admitting any wrongdoing and they see no internal evidence that anyone acted in bad faith. So I do think that that, and, and we don’t know the full picture, obviously, but I do think that this, this is probably one of those situations where a few engineers were doing their job. They’re, they’re, you know, trying to, trying to keep things in check and something somewhere in the paperwork, something didn’t get done correctly. And, and that made some people upset.

Sean P. Holman (51m 26s):

Now, that is a really important point. ’cause I think most of the time when you have these big fines levied and a big press release from the Department of Justice, the company who is involved usually comes out and says, admits no fault, you know, And. It’s sort of like, okay, they’re, they’re paying the money or the fine just to make this thing go away, and they’re willing to pay the money. So, and rather than fight it because they don’t want the protracted legal battle, they don’t want It’s cheaper. Yeah. It’s It is, you know, cheaper to keep her, as they say. But I don’t think people really understand what that might look like. If the press release of we’re not admitting fault. We don’t Think we did anything wrong, might actually have legs. And, and what you’re saying here is, listen, here’s all the, the complexities of designing a modern vehicle with the performance of consumer demands and needs while meeting the regulation, you know, or the regulatory hurdles that are put in place by the government.

Sean P. Holman (52m 19s):

And there’s all these little nuances to it. And, and everybody knows these nuances are going on. Everybody knows that each of these little things might impact, you know, A and B, but not d and e or, or whatever. They’re all aware of it. There’s a right way to do it. A wrong way to do it. It could be something as simple as paperwork. It could be something as simple as, you know, somebody saying, oh, this is how we’ve done in the past, we’re gonna do it here. And then not realizing maybe there’s a compliance person up the chain that needs to know about it to, to report it. So I. I think the thing to go here is, is, you know, we’re not saying, you know, Cummins on purpose cheated the system. And, and Kory said the same thing. He goes, I just didn’t see it in the files.

Sean P. Holman (53m 0s):

I don’t think they knowingly did anything wrong. And you’re sort of saying the same thing. It’s from the looks of it, this looks like it might actually be the case of the company. It kind of got caught off guard by the EPA and was like, well, wait a minute, All, right? Yeah, we will pay the fine, but we’re not gonna say that we did anything wrong. ’cause we still feel our work is solid.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (53m 17s):

But also if they met the emissions standard Peter, like if they, it sounds like what you’re saying is they still complied with the law as far as the tailpipe emissions, but they didn’t disclose how they were doing it. Potentially, they didn’t disclose how they were doing it to the EPA and that pissed them off.

5 (53m 35s):

Yeah, I think it’s more a matter of, of what’s happening outside of the standardized testing. So, like I said, you know, everybody knows that, that the vehicle, you know, think about how a Diesel pickup truck is commonly used. You’re towing heavy loads. You know, just, just go out on, on the roads, you know, on a weekend, like, like this weekend, you know, we got, you got people heading out to the desert for, you know, to celebrate the holidays. And, you know, they’re towing not just ad capacity, they’re towing over capacity. These vehicles get worked really hard and you can’t simulate that in a laboratory. So you have all these operating conditions that exist that, that can’t be tested, but still need to be disclosed.

5 (54m 20s):

So it’s, it’s under those conditions, those operating conditions, that all of that stuff needs to be communicated in one form or another to the agencies and, you know, communication with the agencies. It’s a challenge, but it’s a necessity. And it’s, that’s really, you know, kind of one of the reasons that, that I do what I do is, is helping aftermarket manufacturers go through that process. ’cause the communication aspect of It is, it’s a lot of work, it’s a lot of effort.

Sean P. Holman (54m 48s):

So here’s a kind of a question, and, and I don’t mean this as a, as a gotcha question or anything like that. I’m actually truly curious about it. We know of people in the game, in the industry who will baseline OE vehicles and find out that according to their test equipment, those vehicles didn’t pass smog from the factory floor. Is that something that you ever get made aware of at SEMA that you find? Is it something you go back to the OES and say, Hey, we might have a problem here, our equipment is showing X, Y, Z Or is it something that affects, impacts the aftermarket guys? Because if the, if the truck is barely dirty already and you’re trying to set a baseline for these guys, the aftermarket to have a quote unquote clean product to meet all the regulatory standards, what, what does that interplay?

Sean P. Holman (55m 36s):

Because we, we know it happens on occasion, I just don’t know how big of a deal It is, or if it’s something that you guys would, would ever flag or, or your, in your relationships with the OE say, this is affecting us downstream in the aftermarket. You should know about this. Yeah.

5 (55m 51s):

So the answer to your question is yes, we do see things that cause us to, to question, you know, to ask questions. The reality though is that when, when, when the OEMs are certifying their vehicles originally, so two things to keep in mind here. The, the OEMs do certification in order to sell the vehicle new, right? But they also are, they get spot checked, they get spot checked. This is called in use testing. They get spot checked at about one year, I think it’s one year, two years, and five years. So you have like these three spot checks that happen. And what happened, the way that works is you have the agencies are, are, are pulling vehicles in off of the road and they’re doing testing to make sure that over the useful life of the vehicle, that it remains within compliance.

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (56m 45s):

I got one of those letters, Peter for my TRX. Yep. I was asked to bring it into a laboratory. It’s kind of a laboratory that’s a, a competitor to the SEMA garage. And I said, Nope, I ain’t doing it. I wouldn’t do it anyway. Yeah.

5 (56m 57s):

Yeah. So there are laboratories, independent laboratories that the contract with to do this, this testing, this in, use testing, and it’s done with the oversight of the OEMs, but it’s done independently of them. And, you know, it’s, it’s an, an exercise that the agencies are doing. There’s, you know, there’s a lot of effort that goes into making sure that the vehicles that come in for that testing, you know, they’re good representative vehicles for what’s out on the road. And, you know, you can imagine, you know, the way that that vehicles get used, and this applies to everything, passenger cars, pickup trucks, you know, light duty trucks, medium duty trucks,

Jay “Lightning” Tilles (57m 34s):

Mercedes convertibles, How, dare you. Hey, what, what whatcha talking about? Just saying don don’t know anyone that owns one All, right?

5 (57m 42s):

But they, you know, they go through abuse, they go through different types of driving conditions. So you, you will see a variety of emissions results and it’s very difficult to, it can be difficult to make an assessment based on one vehicle. So, so when in use testing is done, they’re looking at a, at a handful of vehicles, they’ll bring in, you know, anywhere from, depending on the, the fleet size that’s out in, in the real world, they may bring in anywhere from three to a dozen vehicles of each model to evaluate. And you know, there’s, there’s so many different variables that that can come into play. Some vehicles are very stable.

5 (58m 23s):

I mean over the years we’ve seen some that just repeat and, and you know, ital, it almost seems like you, you can do no harm with them. You know, others are just, they, they tend to fluctuate. And it’s a challenge. It’s, it It is a true challenge when we’re trying to do some evaluation on aftermarket products. If you start out with a vehicle that is, you know, not in a passing condition or very close to the standard, it’s gonna make it very difficult to evaluate your, your product. so we often will recommend doing emissions, doing a baseline test. And in some cases you might actually make a comparison bet between the, the baseline and modified conditions to show that the product isn’t having a detrimental impact.