Threat to the whole old car hobby

[50scars]

The February 2008 Issue of HEMMINGS CLASSIC CAR has a column by the Editor In Chief, Richard Lemintello, also a fellow Pontiac Enthusiast, about the EPA rules that will effectively eliminate the ability of us auto hobbiests to even buy the paint to finish our cars unless we have a properly certified booth (I checked with DeVilbis and was told that these start at $100,000, and quickly become expensive), and the person who is buying the paint has to have certification. In an email to me, Richard told me that the EPA has modified the rule to allow a hobbiest to buy paint for 2 cars, or parts there of, every year. Why don't you go read the whole column, rather than take my paraphrase of it. The magazine is well worth subscribing to. I don't know about you, but 2 cars a year is far above my capacity. However, this rule does impact a whole lot of small and actually not so small manufacturers through out this country. I know of lots of factories that turn out things like fuel filters, lamp parts, job shops that make stampings for larger suppliers to the auto industry. I have one customer who paints the heads of screws, and they are exported to Mexico, where they become part of kits that are then shipped back into this country. They all paint with open faced spray booths, that use fiberglass furnace filters to keep the particulates from getting on their employee's cars in the parking lot, or the neighborhood buildings. Are these people likely to spend $100,000 to replace each of those booths, with something that not only will not improve quality or productivity, and actually takes up a whole lot more space, or are these operations going out of the country, along with these jobs? Cabinet shops, small furniture makers, who knows what other little shops will be simply closing if this rule is allowed to stand. Going to the EPA website and complaining is a good idea. An even better idea is to get your representatives involved--enough jobs have left this country because of economics, we don't need more leaving because of bureaucratic ignorance.

[Larry]

Our government can propose/enact laws like this that will put US manufacturing even more steps behind, and yet allow lead paint on childrens' toys to slip into the country from China.

As Pogo said "We have found the enemy, and it is us!"