Thread: vapor canister removal

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i have a 73 chevy nova and i was wondering, how would i remove the vapor canister in the engine compartment? it takes up too much room there and doesnt look very good either. any help is appreciated, thanks!

Vapor cannister is a required part of California smog. Fortunately, your car is old enough not to need it.

Its job is to collect vapors coming off the fuel tank, and feed them to the engine at startup to avoid dumping them into the atmosphere. Haven't heard any real negative effects of them, and I've never worried about them. I'm sure if there's an issue, someone will jump in.

The problem becomes what to do with the vapor line once the cannister is out. I'm not sure I'd want an open vent line from the fuel tank, terminating up near the radiator. Not any more sure I'd just want it venting from the top of the tank up under the trunk. You'd need to work out how to vent the tank, and decide whether you really want fuel evaporating into the South Bay atmosphere on an August afternoon.

As far as the line out of the cannister, I think you can just plug that where it connects to the intake system, and be okay. But I'd prefer to leave the think. Never removed one from my GM cars - didn't seem worth the bother. The newer Taurus I had as a company car had its cannister attached to the bottom of the tire well under the trunk. Must not be too much risk of combustion, but I don't think I like that placement (Pinto -- Pinto -- Pinto).

The one on the Trans Am tucks in up and out of sight next to the rad brace. I had a '72 Vega (pray for me) and it was in the same place. Same for a couple of other Chevy products I had. It took space, but was pretty out of the way.

Either way, good luck with it. '73 is a good year to have, since it doesn't have to be smogged.

My Shelby was the reason for that - a California state politician had it for a while, and when I bought it back from him, he had to spend a fair bit to smog it. Ran back to the bill mill in early 1997 and wrote the law to exempt the "classics" from smog checks.

Merry Christmas!