First of hello to all the Ford guys out there! Before I ask my question to pick some brains on modifications on my 1989 Ford F250 5.8 351w, I have done some work on my truck and resealed up my intake manifold and in the process I cleaned everything nice and neat, then I sanded and repainted my valve covers Ford Blue, which they turned out real nice then I put everything back together and after all that you can’t see 1 square inch of blue through the rats nest of houses and emissions JUNK! So here’s my question, is there any way to delete all those bypass valves and hoses for emissions ect… and still have a way of passing emissions in Utah and still be able to admire my 351 block? How do all the real nice trucks that have pretty engines that you can actually admire? Just looking for ideas!!! Thanks in advance!!!!
Also let me back up a little and state that is there anyway of doing this without having to do a ton of work and major modifications? I was just wondering about with all the new technology these days if there’s a somewhat simple of way of doing this if possible? Also the new Fitech low profile fuel injection air intake throttle body’s type technology kinda lean towards this or am I looking at having to go carbureted and change out ecu, and tons of work? I sure hope so because quite frankly all that junk just looks terrible sitting in big cluster on top of my block!!!

 

I'm not familiar with Utah.
In Maryland, in order to register my truck, it had to be mechanically inspected. Part of that inspection was that the exhaust had to be in its factory configuration, which included a catalytic converter.
When I bought my truck, it had been registered under a historic designation, which didn't require that mechanical inspection, but also came with a list of restrictions on when, where and how I could drive it.
Someone had removed the factory exhaust and installed home made dual exhaust that exited in front of the rear axle.
I decided to put it back to as close to factory as I could get it, and get the full registration.
Since it had to have a catalytic converter, I put the full air injection system back together also. Yup, a bunch of hoses and two valves, but happy computer equals smooth running truck.
Like the song says, it's your thing, do what you wanna do. I would go ask at an inspection station what is required. That's what I did.

 

I live in UT and did I/M inspections since '84 in Davis County and dyno testing since '96 in Salt Lake county
I would leave it stock
Any HP gains would be negligible IMO and you will ahve a check engine lamp on
That said, a 1989 can pass I/M with the check engine lamp "on" as long as the tailpipe emissions pass 1.2 and 220 CO and HC
I vote leave it stock
We ALL breathe the same air

 

There is more than one color of “Ford blue” so which one? A ‘89 engine would have been painted Ford gray and a factory replacement engine would be black. The short answer is “no.” You need to have the emissions systems intact and functioning if you have tailpipe and visual inspections. Having said that how do you expect to pass emissions if you removed all that EFI and “emissions JUNK” and installed a metered fuel leak.

 

Ford used several different versions of the air injection system over the years some of which are quite stealthy compared to others. Does your truck have external air manifolds standing up off the exhsust manifolds with plumbing and valves randomly placed all around the engine? The is the worst version and I can understand wanting to do something about it. Later trucks used either the internal manifold in the cylinder heads or attached a crossover tube across the back of the engine between the exhaust manifolds, and the diverter and bypass valves were positioned low down in the engine bay beside and behind the engine. With something like this you could reatain full functionality with a much cleaner appearance, if the visual inspection simply looks for the presence of components and doesn't care where they are this might be an option.