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And of course the last 3 steps:

figure out why the car is doing things you didn't expect;

find the oil leak;

and wonder where all this added efficiency is.

I'd recommend not doing that. If you have to ask about that sort of thing, then you probably don't fully understand how the systms work or how they affect other things, and you'll be opening up a can of worms and putting them into your car which will then never be quite right again.

 

I'm not sure what "emissions crap" you might be asking about, but of the listed emissions controls for your car, I'll try to break down the components and power used by each.

CATALYST/AIR/BPEGR/PCV/EVAP

Catalyst
A catalytic converter is a completely passive device, requiring no power from the engine to operate. A well designed converter acts as an expansion chamber, allowing exhaust pulses to scavenge the system better than a straight pipe. Considering that you car was originally equipped with a single converter, and the more powerful C5 Corvettes at one time had six (two main, and four "pups") catalytic converters, perhaps you should consider adding a few instead of removing the only one you have. If yours is not clogging, there would be little gain from removing it in a stock application, and you may actually lose some performance. If it's clogged, replace it with a newer three-way converter instead of a section of straight pipe.

Backpressure EGR Valve
The EGR system is one of the least understood "emissions" components. Again, it is a completely passive system, requiring no engine power to operate, and liberating no power if it is removed. In fact, you risk losing power from higher combustion chamber temperatures and lower spark advance/more detonation if you remove or bypass it. Don't take my word for it. Check GMTech's advice at www.SEThirdgen.org for EGR systems.

Positive Crancase Ventillation
Yet another completely passive device. If you're at all concerned about reducing moisture, acids, sludge, and dirt in you engine oil and crankcase, you'll want to make sure the PCV system is working correctly. If you don't mind changing oil every weekend, disconnect it.

Evaporative Emission Control Canister
Another passive device, using only engine vacuum to scavenge fuel vapors from the tank and burn them in your engine. If you're like most of us, you don't get fuel free, but have to purchase it. If you want to burn all of it instead of just letting it evaporate, the EVAP will let you do that. If you can afford to let your dollars literally evaporate, remove the canister. If you simply need more room in the engine compartment, get a junkyard remote EVAP canister from a later S-truck of van, and mount it nearer the tank under the car. The only time you'll get a power loss from an EVAP system is if the hoses or valves are faulty = which only means they've been neglected.

Air Injection-Reaction
This is the only "emissions" component on your car that actually takes some engine power to operate. The air injection pump is belt driven, and can take up to about 1.5-2HP at peak engine RPM to keep spinning. The power used is negligible, unless the pump is damaged. The power steering pump requires more power than the AIR pump, so if you really want some "gains", bolt on a manual steering gear box and get rid of the PS pump instead. If you really want the trick setup, install an electric AIR pump from a later LT1 engine, and have it operate when teh engine is in open-loop mode only. That will free up the belt, the space, and still get your oxygen sensor and cat converter up to temperature fast enough on cold starts to use them to maximum advantage. If you really want to liberate an extra few horsepower, change your real axle oil to synthetic. You'll probably gain about 5-8% of the engine power at the rear wheels simply from the reduced friction. That's about 9-12 HP on your car.

An important thing to remember is that all the emissions "crap" is designed to completely burn the fuel you're pumping into your engine. If you burn all the fuel completely, you're getting all the power from it. If not, some of the power is escaping through the exhaust pipe as unburned fuel. A well-tuned engine will create very low emissions, with or without all the controls in place. The basic reasons for electronic engine controls, emissions systems, and vehicle testing is that most people are too unmotivated, uneducated, or incapable of keeping their vehicles in good tune and well maintained.

 

while i agree with the general statement, thats some really flawed logic.. lol..

 

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Ahhh, see. You've just stated the "serving purpose" and it's benefits.

Most of the "Emission-devices-deter-performance" opinions, are probably still around from the '70's...when a few emmission controls were added at the same time of the decline of the muscle car era.

I think most assumed it was due to smogpumps and cat's when in reality it was due to lowcompression, poor heads, etc, that reduced the power output of the engines.

 

The only reason to remove the stuff is if it isn't working at all, like mine was.

If yours works fine, then I would just leave it alone, it isn't hurting anything, just like Vader said.

 

The other viable reason would be if you really needed every last inch of the space for plumbing and hardware for twin turbochargers, an axial blower and intercooler, or something else cool like that...

 

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Best thing to do is just replace it with a high-flow cat.

Check Summit, Catco ones are less than $100 IIRC, I doubt you can get a straight piece of pipe made and insatlled for that little(considering that it's a $10,000 fine for each and every cat that a shop has removed or bypassed, if they get caught), and that way even if you up and move to California tomorrow, you can take your car with you. Don't laugh, it happens; happened to me in fact. Let me tell you how glad I was that I hadn't hacked my car like you asked about.