What do Steve Saleen and Jesse James, of West Coast Choppers fame have in common? Both of the men have now been fined in California for selling vehicles which did not meet or were not certified for California's emissions requirements. In the case of Saleen, those vehicles started off as Ford products which met the emissions requirements before modification. You are surely aware that California has the strictest emissions laws in the United States and, to sell vehicles there, sometimes special modifications are required, which also means that additional testing is required. Apparently, Saleen is being made an example of, which sounds similar to what happened with Jesse James. The threat of a very large fine - in Saleen's case $700,000 dollars - is probably enough of a deterrent to keep smaller vehicle manufacturers in line with regulations or out of the California market entirely.

Related:

• Jesse James & West Coast Choppers fined $271,250 for smog violations
• More on Jesse James, his CARB settlement and his hydrogen-powered land-speed car

[Source: Mustang Evolution via Autoblog]

I'm sure that you have heard or read about Jesse James being fined for 50 bikes in California between 1998 and today that did not meet emissions requirements. I have a few things to say about it. According to Jesse, he has always been in compliance with CARB. He says that before 1998, he did not make enough bikes to qualify for their requirements. Did you know that he offered at his own expense to fix each bike with a charcoal filter and a muffler? Did you know that CARB denied that request? At first, they said that he was going to fined $22,000 per motorcycle, which eventually got whittled down to $5,000 per bike. Who was responsible to get the bikes fixed or get their registration revoked? I don't know for sure, but I would imagine it was the owners of said bikes. I think that if the desire is to get the situation rectified, then he should have been allowed to fix them. I am not apologizing for Jesse, and I can understand fines and everything, but, really, what is the real goal? To make money off the situation or get it fixed? I would say let him fix it. Fine him something reasonable for his mistake and get the problem fixed.

"Heck," he more or less says. "I was going to protest the payment by setting myself on fire in front of City Hall, but I couldn't afford the fine," according to the article I got this information from.

In other news, Jesse is going after the record of the fastest vehicle powered by hydrogen. The record is currently 186 mph and is held by BMW. Jesse plans to go 250 mph on a creation of his shop's doing. See the photo above.

Related:

• Jesse James & West Coast Choppers fined $271,250 for smog violations

[Source: Press Telegram and West Coast Choppers]