Who remembers the bad old days of muffler tickets?

I couldn't have said it better myself. I live in a residential part of town. That means residence, not racetrack. I work nights too and there's nothing like my neighbor and his "race car" Saturday and Sunday afternoon hitting the loud pedal for almost an hour.

Cutouts are fine... they make the car quiet in the neighborhood and loud when you are out at the track.

 

In 1969, I had a '56 Chevy 2-dr wagon. I had just done a driveway rebuild of the engine and installed a set of Thrush mufflers. I went cruising aroud to see that the engine was ok and a cop stopped me for "excessive noise". He poked around under the car and said those "woodpecker" mufflers were illegal (not true). Then he called me a punk. Big mistake. I said "see ya in court". As it happened I was scheduled to leave for basic training the following week so I asked for a judge to meet with me. After explaining the deal and telling him about being drafted and the cop calling me a punk, the judge threw it out and said he was going to have words with the cop.

 

I used a short chunk of log chain in each of my stright pipes. Worked well , Real easy to get out!!!!!!!

 

It seems the fuzz up here don't have enough to do; I ended up putting fenders back on my deuce while the cop that bought my roadster in Toronto runs highboy. They've also been selective on loud pipes; I haven't been hassled likely because most of my driving is before dark while others get nailed for unquantified noise violations. The bottom line is that you can't apparently beat city hall. Funny thing is, every taxpayer in this town appears to love hot rods.

 

Better hope you don't get stopped by the same cop. Failure to comply is a $150 ticket plus 1 point on your record. Probably more since ticket prices have skyrocketed.

 

I hate to say this, but I wish the police would go after some of the Harley riders.

I grew up in the country, but live in a residential area in the city. In the country, it's not so big a deal, but in the city, with houses close together and 20 feet from the street, it's a different story.

I swear that there are hundreds of Harley riders with open pipes running through the neighborhood.

Really, I don't have a problem with them during the day, and even at night on the weekends its no biggie, but I live near an intersection with a stop sign.

When they get out of the bar at 2am, they seem to feel it necessary to make as much noise as possible leaving the intersection.

It physically rattles the windows on our house, it's so loud. You can actually hear the roar reverberating off the houses as if we were in a canyon. During the day, we literally can't hear the televison indoors with it turned up and the windows closed over some of these guys.

I gotta get to work in the morning and being woken up every 10 minutes from 2am to 3am by drunk a-holes doesn't make me bright and cheerful when I have to get up 3 hours later.

And the old "loud pipes save lives" BS doesn't hold water when they're riding helmetless in cutoff shorts and flip flops with headlights that barely burn. Safety obviously ain't their primary concern.

I can't know for sure, but I suspect most of these guys don't live in my neighborhood - they're on their way home to the more well-heeled hoods nearby, where they likely coast in idling so as not to annoy the people they have to live with. The guys in my neighborhood have to get to work in the morning and aren't out closing bars on a weeknight.

As a gearhead, I don't run complaining to the cops or the city council. But I'll tell you what, if these guys keep making nuisances of themselves, eventually the excrement's going to hit the rotary cooling device, and its going to ruin it for everyone who has anything noisier than a stock muffler - and that will suck.

 

In the "60's, '70's and early '80's tickets were just a part of being a hot rodder. I never got a ticket for "modified exhaust" that didn't have a list of other offenses that I was more concened about ie. "exibition of speed", no fenders....... on and on. I soffened a little in the mid eightys, cleaned up the roadster, mufflers, upholstry, made it a streetrod........no more tickets! Drove the shit out of it for many years but it was getting boring. Built a '26 with some friends in '03, 377, 2x4 tunnel, 12.89/1, 9"spool, 1725#,NO MUFFLERS. I have recieved four trophys over the years for "Loudest Pipes"........the rules have changed! I've been stopped many times on the street and the worst case senarieo was a long ass chewing in front of the county supervisor, mayor and a host of others.......seems I didn't see the CHP behind me as I left a stopsign quickly then slid all around in the gravel at the Museum, covering his car with gravel and dust. He didn't mention anything about the loud exhaust.

 

i got one back in feb of 02. it was $195 no matter if i fixed it or not and i wasnt even running straights then.

 

I had a cop pull me over for loud exhaust more then once, but the best one, was when the cop asked me "does your exhaust have a hole in it?". I wanted to tell him SOO BAD that "yea, its at the back of the car!" but kept my mouth shut. I didn't want a ticket. I was in the bigger city next to the city I lived in and he asked me if I still lived there. I said yes, and he told me if I left town he wouldn't ticket me, and not to come back until it was fixed (this was 3inch straight on a turbo banger o/t car). He was serious too, followed me the 3 miles to the freeway!

But, I am also sick of these wannabe Harley types. My father in law is one, and he came over with this weekend with a Harley motor tattoo on his arm. Really cracked me up! I am rather sick of listening to them. I grew up on the favorite road of wannabe bikers. Every Saturday thats ALL I heard when I was out wrenching. Every 5-10min a group of bikes would go by. The reason I say wannabe bikers, is because its the main back road if that makes any sense. If you never go off the freeway you would think its a back road. But, if you live for back roads, it would be a main road to you! I can think of way better roads in the area to go ride a bike.

I hate yuppies.

 

15 minutes and 15 grand don't make you a biker

 

Back in high school, I used to get a noise ticket at least once a month. Had a 39 Chev with a 324 Olds in it w/smitty's, burned out the day I bought em'. When the fuzz hung me for the pipes, I would stuff em w/ mom's brillo pads, chase a cop down, show em they were fixed, then he would sign off on the ticket. I would get to leave school early for court.Once there, I would hand the magistrate (kinda like a judge)the citation, and I was free to leave. My dad borrowed my car one time, and when I got it back, it had new rear tires, front end fixed and newwwww mufflers. Shit!!!

 

I got popped for a headlight out on my daily (I'd just changed it and needed to wiggle the connector again) and the cop went around it checking for anything he could cite, then let me go, and I started it.. now it was leaking some at the manifold, I needed to redo the bolts, so he tells me I need to get that fixed too. It wasn't loud enough to annoy me yet, and I've heard cycles that were louder.

I should add he didn't write me when I explained I'd just changed the light, but boy, they're looking for revenue hardcore. The kicker is it wasn't even quite dark yet.

 

I've had MANY "Excessive Noise" tickets in my cars. Funny thing is that I really do like to run decent mufflers on everything and have really grown to despise the sounds of open headers and ridiculously loud exhaust.........even at the dragstrip! When King Chassis I and used to go to Memphis for the Hot Rod Fastest Street Car Shootouts in the Nineties and you see 8 and 9 second cars running through the mufflers.......well that did it for me. Big Flowmasters on everything from now on! Anyway, I was rumbling through town a few years ago with a young, pretty 20 year old Philly ridin' shotgun in my '68 LS-6 Camaro when a County Policeman pulled me over for makin' a little bit of noise while driving quite civilized actually........even though I had seem him coming and bumped the trans into neutral. When I told him that the Camaro is really no louder than a typical Harley-Davidson and asked him if he tickets those, he told me that he was a Harley owner himself! Well, I know better than to argue with The Man and just accepted the ticket but it did give me the opportunity to get back in the car, hand the ticket to the girl and in my best "Milner-esque" voice tell her to file it in the glovebox under "C.S."!

 

Actually, another "Excessive Noise" ticket that comes to mind is when I happened to be driving past a gas station late, late one Saturday night and spied a group of Crotch Rockets, or Sport Bikes, filling up. Well, I'm feelin' kinda confident in my 14:1 Compression, 540 CID Dog-Dish hubcap'ed Malibu with it's 4-inch Flowmasters and I bumped the trans into Neutral and "piped" them to get their attention. Ha, the motor wasn't even done coming down yet when I spotted HIM about two seconds later! Needless to say, I was pulled over and I can still hear him asking me "why my engine mysteriously revs up at the just the sight of motocycles".

 

got many on my cars & bikes . just ahead of my time .................. steve

 

Noise tickets, bumper heighth, headlight heighth, defective equipment, blocking traffic, excessive acceleration (never broke the speed limit), no windshield (beat that one - I wear glasses Officer Dickhead!)... but the worst was a ticket for parking on the wrong side of the street in a town so small the streets barely HAD two sides! I asked why it mattered and he wrote me one for hindering an officer.

 

Yeah, it was tickets for excessive noise(exhaust system) un-necessary noise(burn-outs) and Impeding traffic(picking up my girlfiend from High School in a 49 Cadillac with long-hair)..nowadays if a loud motorcycle is coming up fast on my left, when the noise catches up to my open window, your heart can skip a beat if you're not prepared for it....

 

load pipes save lives,they let everyone know your here

 

A test was done in a black and white with the siren going. The people sitting in a moving car were told to raise their hands when they heard the siren. The hands rose after the B&W drove passed. The point of the test was how slow sound traveled in a moving vehicle. In other words, they don't hear you coming, but they sure hear to going. So the argument that loud pipes save lives is mote.

That's why B&W's use wig-wag high beams to attract attention. The study discovered that people didn't notice the red/blue rotating lights during the day.

 

Of course I got one ,That was my first ticket Funniest thing was Half of my scavenger exhaust did actually fall off .I was dumb I paid it .

 

i had a cop pull me over in my daily driver 65 f-100 (ugly black primer and a lil dirty) for loud exhaust and a crack in my windsheild, i hadnt changed my address on my id since i moved and he gave me a ticket for that, i asked him about my what i needed to do for my exhaust and windsheild and he said he didnt care about that he just wanted to make sure i had insurence
cheers
mat

 

$135 ticket for a headlight out of adjustment in my '65 Nova when I was 16 yrs old on a beautiful, sunny, Sunday afternoon. He gave me the full roadside inspection. Tape measure on the front and back too. Only thing he could find wrong was the headlight. Told me he was going to make it hurt.

 

Sign of the times is right. They go after bars with loud music, open air amphi theaters, Saturday night race tracks. This day and age they have to have proof of the sound being excessive.(What is excessive???) Decibal meter reading? How far away from the source of the sound compared to the distance of the complaint. JUST A BUNCH OF BULLSHIT. I guess us HOTRODDers lucked out. Just can't wait to get my 47 Dodge pickup on the road with my flatty 6, split manifold with heat riser removed, Smithey mufflers with full exhaust out the back. RRRRRRRRAPRAPRAP. Watch out window panes.

 

I got a fix-it ticket for a loud muffler in my 4x4 recently. It was really loud.

 

It doesn't matter here. If someone complains, its too loud. They have "Loud Noise" warning which looks like a ticket. If you get one, its warning for 6 months. If you get another complaint within the 6 month period, its turned over to the city, who will bill you for the police response per car. So if 4 radio cars respond with a Sgt, you pay for each car plus the supervisor. The average find for 1 car is $600. Since the city started that program and word got out how expensive it was, its been so quiet.........

 

IL will give a ticket for loud pipes.If a cop has a slow day you will get one.

 

The idiom about loud pipes on bikes is true. The rider isn't worried you won't see him behind you, he can outmaneuver you and more than likely stop far quicker than you can... his concern is when he's beside you and you decide to change lanes, that's where the loud pipes come to his rescue, you may not see him in your blind spot, but you'll sure as hell hear him.

Also, beware the biker who has a hammer hanging off his bike, it's not there so he can pound nails, it's so he can remove your sideview mirror if you cut him off: it's not like it did you any good anyhow

 

Back in '75, I had a '65 Chevelle w/ a tunnelram and fenderwell headers, drove it to highschool everyday w/ open headers. One day I got a written defective equipment warning for no mufflers, and given 3 days to correct the problem.

Later that friday night I was cruise'n down our town's main drag, listening to the open headers echo off of the brick buildings (i had just been given 3 free days of open headers, right?), and a different cop pulls me over and gives me a ticket for no mufflers. Later that month I took it to court, (happened to be my 18th birthday), mentioned to the judge that I was given 3 days to install mufflers, so I felt that the later ticket should be thrown out. Judge looks at me, says "happy birthday", and throws the ticket out.

True story.

 

So its late fall in 1971 and I just got my Md.State Inspection license.

Its a Tuesday nite,midnite or so and 5 of us are settin in my buddys 68 Z/28 which is now a full bore race car (for 1971).

Were drinkin a few brewskis and tryin to keep warm and he has the engine running-open tubes of course.
Were in this shopping center hangout and we have our backs to the road.

Local State trooper cruises down the road behind us and hears the rumble of the Lunati small block.

We dont see him till he pulls in the shopping centers entrance.Immeadently the engine goes silent.

He rolls right up to us (as we scramble to hide the beer),gets out and says-"Start it up"!

My buddy John who owns this beast lites it up and proceeds to break the sound barrier.

Cop says ,"Boy your gettin a ticket for all this noise" and writes one up for "Excessive noise".

Well I"m 3 sheets to the wind courtesy of the PBR"s and I yell from the back seat "Gimmie that muther f--ker". I sign the ticket and shove it back in the State boys face and proceed to tell him that as a Md. State inspector" I Dont think its too loud".

The look on his face was worth it.

Next day at 9:00 A.M., State "E" was there looking for my ass at work to let me know that he was boss.

Back in those days it was up to the inspector to make the judgement call.

It was a great story that we still laugh about at reunions.

Oldmics

 

in the 1980s I could not make one day running loud pipes without getting a ticket. I had over 100 fix it tickets (most for to low) in one car. I had three tickets before lunch time more than a few times. These days cops don't even seem to write two low or loud pipe tickets at all. I guess they have better things to do these days