A couple of months ago or so, my daughter's 2005 C230 threw a code. I read it and it was a catalytic converter, O2 sensor, and fuel vacuum codes. I got some catalytic converter cleaner, when the tank was low, I added it to the gas and drove the car to hopefully clean out the cat. I drove it because my daughter drives it only sporadically and for short distances. I put 1/2 tank of gas in the tank cleared the codes so she wouldn't have to look at the CEL on the dashboard all the time. I then drove it around town for 15 minutes a few times. No codes popped but there were tests that apparently hadn't run that my scanner found (same systems - cat, O2 sensor, fuel vacuum). I talked with the owner of a shop I trust and he said I needed to get several cycles of hot and cold for the test to run. I drove the car for 20 - 30 minutes around town several times. Going up to 50 mph, some stop lights, etc. Eventually the fuel vacuum test ran successfully but the cat and O2 sensor tests hadn't. I went back to the shop and talked to another guy who said I needed to run the car on the highway for 30 to 40 minutes. So far I've done that once and the cat and O2 sensor tests didn't get run.

This is getting ridiculous. I've put over a tank of fuel through the car, drove it around town more than a half dozens times, drove it on the highway at 75 mph for 30 minutes or so and I can't get all the tests to run so I can get it inspected. What if someone doesn't do any highway driving? I guess those tests do run sometime because they threw a code when my daughter was driving but I can't seem to get those tests to run again!

I guess I should make it clear that the inspection is largely about pulling information from the OBD2 port and the inspection can't be completed without a successful complete scan.

Does anybody have any suggestions?

 

Hell yeah, I had MANY problems getting my car to pass over and over.
The damn "Readiness monitors", mainly the catalytic converter refused to turn over.
I did have to fix some vaccum leaks, and over the years I replaced O2 sensors,
MAF, the air flap for the supercharger twice, and the Cat again. 3 times in total probably actually only needed it once.
The secondary air injection refused to turn over once and I had a habit of waiting for it to
warm up and kick off before driving but one day in a hurry I took off and
revved up a bit and it kicked over. Saints be praised I hate those F'ing things.
Even with a reciept for a new cat they won't pass it.
Too many times I let the registration lapse and then you are completely screwed because after 6 months, if
it doesn't turn over your car can be impounded for failing to register it, even if you paid the fees.
So then they scrap your car!!! Too many times I was sweating bullets driving thousand of miles and still not turned over
and getting perilously close to 6 months.

I won't say I did this, but one thing to do is register at a friends place in a county
that does not require smog BEFORE the registration runs out. Just go down to AAA office, put in change of address for that vehicle, say it's a vacation home or something, and pay the fees. Done. Keep your license the same.
Fact is you could just pick any address at random, change the address where the vehicle is garaged
and pay the fees at AAA. They provide DMV services but they're not as inquisitive as the DMV.
Say you misplaed your renewal notice, pay the money get your tags in hand.
Some poor soul will get your renewal notice and likely toss it. I now live in OR and no smog is required where I live, thank god!
And you pay your registration only once every 2 years for ~$80 instead of ~$200+ EACH year on an old car and smog.
I have a garage now, can fix things and my car now runs good. Finding a NOS Siemens MAF from 2002 brand new in the box was a turning point.
Haven't checked the readiness monitors recently, now I'm curious and I'll have to take a look.
Assuming you are in CA, here's a list of counties that don't require smog at least as of a few years back.
Alpine
Amador
Calaveras- San Andreas
Del Norte
El Dorado- Placerville
Humboldt
Imperial
Inyo
Lake
Lassen
Mariposa
Medicino
Modoc
Mono
Placer- Auburn
Plumas
Riverside
San Bernardino
San Diego County
Sierra
Siskiyou County
Sonoma County- Santa Rosa
Trinity County
Tuolumne County- Sonora

"There are six counties that require smog certifications within certain Zip Codes only. These counties are:
El Dorado, Placer, Riverside, San Bernardino, San Diego, and Sonoma."

 

Thanks for the reply, 'Coupe! I'm in North Carolina so things may be different here but I'll check into it. Thinking of new addresses, maybe I should register the car in Alabama. I understand they don't do inspections at all! A college buddy of mine used to live there and if he was willing, that might be ideal but he went back to New Orleans to be closer to the grandkids. Can't blame him.

Thanks again. It looks like there's no easy solution to this!

 

Thanks for helping this SoCal dweller out. My buddy just moved out here from Salem and pulling his hair out with the cost of things.

Local cops seem to get their jollies looking for locals who may be staying too long with their out of state plates. There’s a lot of $100k+ exotic cars down here from OR

 

Is your buddy still getting his mail forwarded?
Ask him what the process is like. Like can you live in one state, and register a car in another state?
Use AAA?
Maybe you can use a mailboxes etc address?
I don't know. Does NC require smog checks throughout the whole state?
I hope it's not as bad as Cali, impound your car after 6 months overdue if found on the road, leave you standing on the side of the road with your posessions. Saw that quite a lot. You can't get it back if it's not registered, and you can't register it unless it's smogged.
So they KEEP it! And if you could get it back, they'd charge an arm and a leg to get it out of impound.

Do you need ALL the readiness indicators to turn over? Originally in Cali I think on 2002 you could
have 2 not turn over, then I think it was one and then none! Yeah, get those old cars off the road and
force you to either buy an electric, walk, or use public transit. They can bite me.
BTW- Good to see you still lurking here. I ressurected the old thread with my Ghetto hatch and saw your posts
from waaaay back. Wow, 22 years for me driving the same car (when it runs)....till it dies or I do. LOL.

 

Yeah, they even had a hotline to report people who don't switch to Cali plates.
Just got my benzo renewal notice today in OR.
Not as cheap as I thought. People on 'Leaving California" forums on FB tell of states with $25 registration...
Alabama maybe? Anyway, it's $136 for TWO years, not one. And NO smog. In Cali it would be minimum $200 a year + smog
minimum $100 if it passed so at least $500 for the same time frame. . Gawd, and then you fix something and have to clear the error and sheet bricks till the readiness indicators come around. We have 3 cars so thats $1500 + and the
terrible fear of impoundment for failing smog.

 

My buddy from Salem finally ended up doing CA Reg and plates. Too risky to put it off. I knew there was a number to report vehicles that were smoking or polluting, but out of state tags? Ruthless. A haters hot line.

I just read the tailgate threads. Damn good info. Went through scenario that 2x on our 90 Corrado g60 we’ve had since new. You got off lucky on your repair. AAA tried to total the Corrado the 2nd time when a F350 rear ended it.

Ended up driving down to San Diego to get a bumper & hatch from a VW forum member to keep it from being totalled. A cool guy gave me a suburban as a rental so the bumper & tailgate fit in back. Later caught AAA lying about “no parts for repair available”. I feel your pain.

 

It has been a long time! I have very occasionally lurked here when something blows up on one of my cars and I saw you posting but I didn't see Glyn anywhere and I figured he'd moved on. I wonder if you're the last active member here from back then! My profile has an accurate list of my cars so I still have my old 2005 sedan and now my daughter has one (she hates Japanese or Korean cars so I had to get her a German car!).

My buddy hasn't been in Alabama in many years so there's no connection to the state anymore. As for NC, I believe the state is pretty much all the same and yes, all the readiness indicators need to turn over. If you're late in updating your registration, they charge you a fine but they don't steal your car at least so the biggest worry is the size of the fine. But I called the local stealer to see if there was some way they might goose it to run the tests but there apparently isn't. Anyway, the service writer there told me something very interesting: When the car becomes 20 years old, it only has to pass a safety inspection so the whole deal with readiness indicators becomes moot. That happens either in January if it is calculated on a calendar basis or February if it is calculated from the build month. I looking to see if there is some way to maybe just slide into the next year and show them that the readiness indicators never flipped so they can go light on the fine. We'll see but in the meantime, I'm just happy that there is a light at the end of this tunnel!

Enjoy Oregon! I understand it's beautiful up there. Now that you have a garage, your car should be much easier to maintain. Unfortunately mine sit outside under an oak tree! I'm rambling now...

I'll let you know what happens.

 

Well Slammer is still around. And maybe a couple other guys.
Oregon is Democrat (only in the big cities) but overall they're not as
highly strung as Cali in terms of the rules. I didn't register my car right away when I moved here,
it was paid up till Nov. in Cali and I hadn't switched my license so I just paid it in Cali one year,
Crescent City is 30 miles away. Went to DMV and got my tags.
Oregon doesn't care if you let your other state reg lapse. No penalty. And
I was late paying the Oregon reg on my Dad's old Ford (great backup car)
and again, no penalty. In Cali your insurance lapses on a car you may not
even be driving, they suspend your license through the mail! I had a hard time
getting an answer here about that because they just couldn't comprehend
what I was saying, since it was just incomprehensible to them that anyone would do that,
but eventually I got the answer, the anwer was no, they don't do that.
Both cars broke down within a week of moving (before)! Towed the MB and left the Ford in
field on a friends property for a year, till I could get it. So we only had the ML for a while.
Got AAA to tow it the 1st 200 miles, and then swooped down and back in one day,
took like 12 hours. It needed new clutch hydraulics and general maint.

When I 1st moved here, you had to take a driving test,
and well anyway, later they decided as long as you have a valid license from elsewhere no
test required. But when you 1st register a car they charge you a title transfer fee and it cost like
$330 in total for the 1st 2 years.And the license was ~$75 for I think 7 or 8 years so $400 out the door
yike for license and reg on one vehicle and then the same again on the other minus the license.
No inspections and no smog!!

Took me 2 years to get the garage cleaned out to work on the cars.
"Carly" the W203 needed an alternator, and shortly after a starter as well as a MAF,
plugs and some coils packs.
And it turned out the front AMG brakes finally needed pads and rotors (down to the rivets) which I already had.
Akebono pads lasted 170K miles PLUS. While doing the pads I noticed my nearly new tires
(that had been sitting a lot so, only 5 years old but with little miles) had the tread seperated on the inside!
No Sumi dealer around here to file a claim with so, new tires!
Then the shifter went out (again), but again already had a spare on hand from 1/2 price day at picknpull.
Paid like $15 for it shift knob, boot and all. Perfect! And then the original thermostat finally quit,stuck open, also had one on hand from the "extreme couponing" days. Recharged the AC, but it's leaked now. Need to determine where. Still has about 25 psi though.
Finally got the steering wheel refinished but f'd up and didn't disconnect battery, now SRS error and iCarssoft won't
clear. Arrgh. Need to pull airbag and see if I failed to connect anything.
Head gasket STILL leaking on #4 (common failure) but then it's been leaking for 100K miles, and
I just keep topping it up. So now almost 260K miles, and it's running just fine
except for leak. Wondering how long before something else happens.
I've been planning to do the head gasket, but hard to want to mess with it, when it's running so good.
So many people seem to do the head gasket only to have the chain snap around this mileage.
Crossing my fingers on that one. Put the exhaust back to stock some time ago
working on the street in San Ho.(Got and $80 ticket too).
No more header, no more Remus and thats a good thing.
Quiet!

 

Geez, Coupe!!! You really have been put through the ringer! Thank goodness a Mercedes is really reliable, right?
At least you're in a more sane part of the world that doesn't keep trying to take your car away!

I've had better luck with my MB but then I think I only have about 125,000 miles on mine. My daughter's is the one that's giving me all the problems and it only has 86,000 on it. I did have a problem with my daughter's where the drains under the windshield got plugged up from oak tree droppings. The water rose and spilled into the fuse box and then into the car. Having the stealer fix it for a little over $2K was the best money I've spent there. Their wrench pulled out the carpets, replaced to other electronic gizmos (which were actually very inexpensive) inside and also replaced the fuse box and I think the front SAM and reprogrammed it. There was certainly no way I was going to get another car for my daughter for $2K! I think MBs are meant to be stored in a garage but my garage keeps my wife's CR-V and the Lotus.

So far, the worst that's happened to my car recently is the battery will die occasionally. Since I've retired about ten years ago, I don't drive much and when I'm alone, I drive my Lotus if I can so my C230 is sometimes my backup car - like when I rebuilt the tranny of the Lotus. The other thing is that seemingly every few thousand miles, I need a new windshield. I think I've had 5 windshields in it since I bought it. One installer nearly destroyed the VIN plate under the windshield (it's made of paper!) but the policeman at the DMV said it was good so I guess it's ok.

I have to say I love my Akebonos! They seem to last forever, they don't make dust, and they have good bite. I'm trying to find some for my Lotus but I upgraded my brakes with calipers that aren't used in the US so I have to find a European supplier.

Well, I expect you're happier in Oregon than in San Francisco (wasn't it?). I haven't been in SF since 1980 and it was beautiful then. From all I've heard, they've ruined the city!! It's a real shame! I guess if you play stupid games, you get stupid prizes.

 

Yeah, these readiness indicators were (obviously) not intended to be as they are being implemented. If pass at the tailpipe, who cares if you have a CEL? As far as reliable,well I owned an X19 before this for 20 years and put 150K+ miles on it.
And just like the Italian cars, they're great when they're running properly! I always told my service advisor on my MANY visits in the 1st 100k miles (extended warranty) "Mercedes builds the best Italian cars in all of Europe". I didn't know how true that was till the starter went out and it was MAGNETTI MARRELLI !!!
MANY of those vists were for ESP errors, like geez 5 or 10 times! In all the time it was under warranty they
NEVER fixed it. Good for a few miles and then it came back. I had to pull the overdrive pulley each time before visiting, lest they void my warranty! Later, (on my own dime at an indy mech had a wheel sensor fail, and the mechanic told me to just the sensor off ebay. I did, for $40 (vs like 700 new+ dealer markup) and never had an problem since! So it was the car it was the dealer. Too cheap to replace the sensor! They created as many problems as they fixed many times. It got to the point where I would make the SA inspect the work before I made the 60 mile RT from Ben Lomond. Then he'd call back and say 'don't come'! I can't imagine PAYING those idiots to work on my car.
I had that happen in a FIAT X19 I used to own, but it didn't effect any electronics, just got into the heater vent and fogged up with windshield while I was on a freeway. Ive been lucky on that. I did find the fusebox/SAM unclipped once after service by Mercedes.
You gotta watch them! I clean those vents a few times a year!
Why is that? Mine was smashed in Santa Cruz once. I heard the local gang at beach flats was "red" and didn't' like anything blue. Stooopid!
Local kid where I lived in Ben Lomond told me he knew a girl who got beat up for wearing a blue dress! Geez.
At this point it's very crazed. I'd love to replace it, but I doubt there's anyone around here who can do the work correctly.
I've had windshields replaced on 2 other cars and both leaked, damaging the windshield frames, so I live with the
crazed windshield.
The only pads I use on all our cars!
I didn't live in San Fran. I don't like the big city. I lived in Sunnyvale and San Jose at time, and near the coast in Scotts Valley and Ben Lomond and also Los Gatos. But it was getting so crowded. Hard to say you don't like big cities when you live in San Jose, which has more people than San Fran, just more spread out. San Jose is huge like 20 miles at least in each direction or more. And it takes forever in traffic to go anywhere. People are rude etc.
I miss some things. Hard to get medical care here, many things require driving 100 miles or more to neasest major city Medford.
I haven't made the trip in a few years though. No Mercedes around here hardly, no picknpull's or Merc machanics closeby. For my next trick, I'm going to pull the front bumper and replace the windshield washer tank. My car was sideswiped in a parking space (bad luck space, I saw multiple cars get smash there, I was lucky!) in San Joser and they knocked the left corner of the front bumper off, broke the side marker, and the tank has been
leaking for a quite a while since then. I have a spare tank from Picknpull. Going to put that in after I get new seals for it, and maybe drop and clean the intercooler while I"m at it.
Regarding rain, yes my car sat in the rain here for 2 years. 80 inches in the rainy season!!
MANY problems. But most cleared up once the car dried out.
Whew! Got lucky there! In that regard, I've ordered new tail light seals (coming from Germany), as I've read they can leak and cause trouble with the wiring and SAM in trunk. I seem to have another leak, possibly from the new hatch. Maybe needs to be adjusted. Then again it leaked before that.
Trunk area gets all wet. And then car won't start, or does starts but with headlights on constant, and
dash dead. OR the fan is on constant. Cleared up when dry!
My paint got f'd up on the hood. I had a car cover on it, which got wet,
and bubbled up the paint on the hood. Otherwise all sheet metal is straight and paint (mostly) good.
But yes, keeping in garage sure helps. Everytime I get it wet, water gets in the SAM area and I the dash lights up "malfunction, alternate tail lights in use", which then clears up when it's dry.
So hopefully this fixes that problem.

 

Windshields... for some reason, my car was a rock magnet. I don't know how it finds them. I didn't follow gravel trucks or anything. It's crazy. Thankfully insurance pays it and they come to my house to fix them.

Italian parts on an MB??? That's pretty wild. Wilder than what a friend of mine told me. My friend used to wrench on Ferraris and he said there were there were lots of Fiat parts in them - and as I remember, that was before Fiat bought Ferrari.

Not SF... Maybe it was the sloped looking driveway in your picture... Or just my poor memory. At least I was geographically close! It sounds like you're WAY out in the country! With so much online, I imagine it's a lot more manageable to do that now but then, as you say, doctors and some other things that aren't very handy. When we moved up here in NC, the nearest grocery story was 15 minutes away. A BIG change from living just outside New Orleans. Since then things have gotten A LOT more crowded. Sometimes at certain times of the day, it's a struggle to get out of our neighborhood on to the main road! A lot of things are a lot closer now but I'd go back to the way it was if I could! Of course, we're nowhere near as rural as you are! From time to time I have wished I was further out in the sticks. Not enough to actually do it though!!

Windshield washer tanks... Given your car was hit, you probably have a crack in your tank but I had a leaky washer tank once. It looked like the water was coming out where the pump goes in the bottom of the tank. I tried sealing the pump a dozen different ways. IIRC, I got tired of fooling with it and tired of not having any washer fluid and took it to the shop down the street and they found that the pump was leaking! The leak was on the side of the pump you couldn't see so it looked like it was a bad seal between the pump and the tank. A new pump fixed it! Maybe that will be useful if you don't have a bad tank.

So, how many miles have you got on your coupe now? I thought I saw a post from you a few years ago saying you had something like 250,000??? Whatever, I know it's a lot!

 

This doesn't happen in SoCal with all the military personnel living in the area. They are allowed to keep their home state plates.