What did you do to your Volvo today? Topic is solved

[bmdubya1198]

I couldn't imagine having to deal with that awful SMOG inspection. NC has emissions and safety inspection every year for OBD2 cars (another $30 fee) and 1995 and older cars have only a safety inspection, which only costs $13.60. Meanwhile down in SC, no inspections at all!

[abscate]

We do safety every year for $21 which includes all OBDII emissions equipment working, but no sniffing like CA

Of course, if you ever saw air in CA in the 1950,60,70s you don't complain about smog testing.

[Rattnalle]

We do both emissions and OBD testing. No emission or safety associated codes allowed. Cars with faulty emissions systems kill people all around unless you live in the middle of nowhere so I'm all for it.

[Rattnalle]

We've got an app for changing ownership using digital IDs over here.. your way seems slightly more inconvenient.

Wow, that would be amazing! It is very inconvenient... I've had an issue almost every time I buy a car because of the ridiculous title system in the wonderful state of North Carolina! That's why I prefer buying cars from South Carolina, it's a lot easier to just have the previous owner sign the title and I'm on my way.

I need the cars title (a copy can be ordered for free by mail) to add it to the app. Then just scan both person's drivers licenses or ID cards and approve using digital ID on the phone.

Or fill in and mail the form on the back of the title. Not very inconvenient either except you actually need to add a stamp yourself and who has those lying around..

[bmdubya1198]

We do safety every year for $21 which includes all OBDII emissions equipment working, but no sniffing like CA

Of course, if you ever saw air in CA in the 1950,60,70s you don't complain about smog testing.

For us I believe it's an automatic fail if you have a CEL on, and I think you can have up to 2 monitors showing incomplete. They don't do the sniffer here either, but they do a visual inspection for a cat.

Oh, I'm sure it makes a difference. I have no problem having those sorts of inspections in heavily populated areas like most parts of CA. Fortunately a lot of my county is rural and they're not as worried.
For most people, it makes sense to have the emissions inspections, but it sucks for people who like to build cars. If I wanted to get another NB Miata and do a turbo build like I've wanted to, it would be hard to do it all and keep the OBD2 in tact for inspection purposes. Or any other swap that requires a standalone ECU... like an LS1 and RWD conversion for one of my P80s (yes, I read a thread once asking about that...).

I need the cars title (a copy can be ordered for free by mail) to add it to the app. Then just scan both person's drivers licenses or ID cards and approve using digital ID on the phone.

Or fill in and mail the form on the back of the title. Not very inconvenient either except you actually need to add a stamp yourself and who has those lying around..

That's awesome that it can all be done on an app for you guys. I wish they would modernize the title/registration system over here!

[WhatAmIDoing]

I hate all the bureaucracy around owning an automobile these days. Just think, in 3 years all 98 and older P80s will be considered historical vehicles, which in most states means no more inspections, no emissions, and even no yearly taxes!

[bmdubya1198]

That is crazy to think that a P80 is considered a classic. Hell, '93-'94 850s are already past that threshold.

[j-dawg]

We do safety every year for $21 which includes all OBDII emissions equipment working, but no sniffing like CA

CA doesn't require a sniffer after a certain year, I think 2000. They just check for codes. But many smog places actually do the visual inspection to verify that everything from the intake to the cat is present and factory stock or CARB approved. This means even if you're not throwing codes or failing the sniffer, you can be failed for modifications. Frustrating.

However: many other rules are surprisingly accommodating in California. For example, lost your title, as we were discussing earlier? Fill out REG 227 when you sell your car and the buyer doesn't even have to bring you to the DMV. Want to swap your engine out for one from a completely different car? As long as the other car is newer and you bring all the emissions equipment with it, go for it. From now on your car will be smog tested as if it were that newer car.

(That one's a little tricky - if you want to have CARB treat your car as anything that originally came with OBD2, you have to swap all the electronics too. But at least there's a set of rules to accommodate that desire.)

More realistically, regardless of what the rules are, everyone's just got their favorite smog guy who looks the other way and sticks his thumb in the sensor during the test.

[bmdubya1198]

We do safety every year for $21 which includes all OBDII emissions equipment working, but no sniffing like CA

CA doesn't require a sniffer after a certain year, I think 2000. They just check for codes. But many smog places actually do the visual inspection to verify that everything from the intake to the cat is present and factory stock or CARB approved. This means even if you're not throwing codes or failing the sniffer, you can be failed for modifications. Frustrating.

However: many other rules are surprisingly accommodating in California. For example, lost your title, as we were discussing earlier? Fill out REG 227 when you sell your car and the buyer doesn't even have to bring you to the DMV. Want to swap your engine out for one from a completely different car? As long as the other car is newer and you bring all the emissions equipment with it, go for it. From now on your car will be smog tested as if it were that newer car.

(That one's a little tricky - if you want to have CARB treat your car as anything that originally came with OBD2, you have to swap all the electronics too. But at least there's a set of rules to accommodate that desire.)

More realistically, regardless of what the rules are, everyone's just got their favorite smog guy who looks the other way and sticks his thumb in the sensor during the test.

Well that's good at least. But I'd assume there's a little more extreme of a punishment involved if the inspector gets caught than the inspectors around here who do you a favor when they don't charge you the $10 window tint fee, or pass your car when you have below 35% tint!
Fortunately for me my cousin is now an inspector!

If the seller lost the title, it's a similar process here. If they don't have a buyer yet, they go to the DMV, pay $20 and fill out a duplicate title form. Otherwise the buyer and seller meet at the DMV and fill out a duplicate with transfer form, which also costs $20 on top of the regular $52 title transfer fee and 3% highway use tax (on the DMV's value of the car... which is usually WAY more than it's worth or I paid, of course!).
When it gets tricky is when the seller never had the title in his or her name.

I get what they're trying to do, but the restrictions on modifications are just ridiculous. I mean, it's not like everyone is going to be modifying their cars. I get that "every little bit counts" for reducing emissions, but I don't think Joe Shmo who just drives his car to work and the store and wherever else and isn't into cars is going to care about modifying his car in any way. California seems like hell for car enthusiasts!

[abscate]

I think its county by county in CA, but generally its 1976 and on for smog for gas engines.

Cars are about 100x cleaner on tailpipe emissions and 1000x cleaner on HC from fuel evap than the 1960s

It only takes 1 car out of 1000 to negate these gains if you relax standards. They are pretty active in looking for stations that are not testing to standards with very high fines, like business-ending level fines.