[RANT] California Air Police

[5-90]

I've spent the last half-hour on the phone with them (ten minutes of that was spent wading through IVR...) and got more answers that I didn't like.

Apparently, the Feds are also involved - extorting California (who does enough extortion on their own, thank you very much...) by threatening to withhold their "matched tax dollars" or whatever - which is, oddly enough, our money in the first place. WTF?)

Why did I call? I'm being sent - for the THIRD time in a row - to a "Test Only" station. Why for? I'm still not sure - the guy I was talking to (Marvin - actually quite helpful) was able to look up my numbers on his terminal

My last failure was in 1999 (I don't recall why,) and I've consistently shown good numbers since. Hell, he said I show better numbers than vehicles ten years newer!

So, why for am I going to "Test Only" stations, and paying $90 for a smog test on a $55 renewal? Because, despite my numbers, I'm still lumped into a "gross emitter" category because my vehicle is 20 years old (Hm - how long is that "rolling exemption?" 25 years, or 30?) and, apparently, this class of vehicle "commonly fails test." Bugger.

1) I plan to write my state reps - I'm getting tired of this.
2) If you own an XJ in CA, please PLEASE please maintain it well and lower your emissions numbers. For all of our sakes - I can't be the only one getting hot under the collar about this! It's bad enough our renewals are going up on their own ($55 this year, $46 last year. WTF?) Hell, if you own an XJ and are under the thumb of the Air Police anywhere in the country, let's work on this. It's possible to have nearly zero emissions with these things. If I can do it on RENIX, you can do it with HO easily enough (if they'd let me work a few things out, I could put my emissions even lower...)
3) Perhaps more of us should take Item #1 to task, and get these people snowed under with paper. They don't seem to be thinking...

[/RANT]

Note that, for the record, I have nothing against "trying to improve air quality" or whatever they're calling it this week - I just get tired of the way they're trying to do it. Apply some thinking to the problem. If you're going to make a decision on a technical issue, learn something about the technology and how it works - first. Don't rely on advisors, either...

 

[Rev Den]

You have to pay for a air test?!?!

IL just dropped testing for vehicles pre OBDII

You should move.

Rev

 

[87manche]

You have to pay for a air test?!?!

IL just dropped testing for vehicles pre OBDII

You should move.

Rev

california is crazy, and where I live in OH we've never had e-check.
You should move

 

[XJPhoenix]

Brutal.

I'm not really sure the Powers That Be based their judgement of the XJ on reality. Why? My old 1991 passed it's e-test (emissions test for us Canucks) with flying colours; then a month later I found out that the cat was clogged! The O2 sensor, cat, plugs, cap, rotor and wires were replaced right then and there; I wonder what numbers my Jeep was running then?

I try my best to take care of my Junk. I patch the rust, change the oil, and if my little lady needs a sensor, I buy it.

I feel your pain... I've owned cars that've cost me a pretty penny; and that I know would've passed it's test if tested fairly. (We've had a big stink about test sites that've been caught doctoring the tests.) Another bone of contention? Passing or failing can depend on how well the machinery is maintained, how warm/long the car/Jeep was when tested, or how fresh the oil in the crankcase is!

*sigh*

It's all a sham. It's a cash-grab instituted by government and capitalized upon by several greedy would-be protectors of the environment, who're lining their pockets with ill-gotten gains at the motorists expense. Yes, there are many honest shop-owners out there who run their establishment with the moral fibre that'd gag a goat; but there are soooooooo many more who tweak a reading to get $400 in repairs.

Now we have the government flip-flopping on when/if they'll be ending the program. We have studies showing that e-testing has had little to no effect on pollution. We have companies that pump hundreds of tons of pollutants into our air being able to buy clean air credits from companies that comply with existing emissions laws! And then the Man steps on my neck to jump in line and drop my pound of flesh at their whim?

*pant, wheeze*

Okay. I'm done.

 

[5-90]

Yeah. The "no basis in reality" I can agree with - I've got an 88 with 260Kmiles on the clock - no less than five transmissions, but the original engine. Damn thing runs like a beast, and runs clean. My emissions numbers - unless something has broken - are consistently better than vehicles ten years newer!

And, I'm not entirely stupid - I make sure he's warmed up before I go in, usually change the oil sometime in the week before, and even buy decent gas (other than that, XJ's are cheap drunks. Run fine on pretty much anything, I've noted.)

I think I've only had two failures in four XJ's - both were due to parts wear, and one, I remember, was due to the EGR valve (it failed when manually activated - the numbers were fine. In fact, the numbers were worse with the new EGR valve. I still don't get why they made me change it...)

Throw in the fact that decisions are typically made by people with no technical knowledge, and enforced/tested by people with minimal technical knowledge, and is it any wonder we're all getting bent about this?

Your example of companies buying smog credits from each other is also good - they put out more pollution in a month than I do in two years. At least CA is finally going to start smogging Diesels and motorcycles...

Now, if we can just do something about those damn gas-fuelled leaf blowers. There's a massive waste of fuel! At least lawnmowers actually do some work - what can you do with a leaf blower that you can't do with a broom? Ever catch two gardeners blowing a single leaf back and forth?

Gawd.

 

[DrMoab]

california is crazy, and where I live in OH we've never had e-check.
You should move

Will you take him? Personally I am sick of all the Californians moving here because they are sick of the way they run things...only to try and turn this place into another California.

No offense to the Californians on the board here....You guys voted the dumb asses into office who are dictating this crap to you...you can stay there and live with it.

 

[5-90]

Will you take him? Personally I am sick of all the Californians moving here because they are sick of the way they run things...only to try and turn this place into another California.

No offense to the Californians on the board here....You guys voted the dumb asses into office who are dictating this crap to you...you can stay there and live with it.

I most certainly did not - and neither did my wife! We don't vote for those statist socialists who are trying to turn California into a Police State, a Welfare State, or any other somesuch nonsense.

We feel like expatriated Americans rather than Californians. I have a hard time thinking of California as a part of the United States anymore - and I'm just "temporarily mislocated."

I certainly don't want to turn anywhere else into another California - I'd honestly prefer to turn California into pretty much anything but what it is now, or what they're trying to make it.

Damn nanny state. I am big enough and old enough to look after myself, thank you very much - and I resent their efforts and insinuations otherwise.

 

[DrMoab]

I wasn't talking about you personally. Just your state as a whole. It's filled with some very stupid people.

I meant no offense to you and would accept people like you here anytime. That part was a joke.

It doesn't however change the fact that we have a ton of people moving here with that attitude though.

 

[5-90]

I know - I've never been able to lump myself in with the rest of California. As far as I'm concerned, they can have the state when I leave - and I volunteer to set the charges along the state line. Let's put the whole damn place inside a moat, and refill the Salton Sea!

I consider myself not a Californian, but a "misplaced Hoosier." I didn't grow up out here, and I don't plan to die and be buried out here (I'd rather be cremated and shot out of a cannon anyhow.)

If it's not the Liberal Yuppies encouraging the passage of laws we neither need nor want (but will cost us money anyhow,) it's the immigrants who can't be arsed to learn the language and assimilate themselves as Americans! Wasn't it Theodore Roosevelt, in 1907, who said "... there is room for but one loyalty, and that is loyalty to America. There is no room for hyphenated Americans!"

And this was 100 years ago - which shows it was becoming a problem then. We've simply allowed it to continue unchecked - and we're paying for it with all this bilingual education nonsense (that costs extra money, and waters down the content in the classroom.)

Yurf.

I wasn't talking about you personally. Just your state as a whole. It's filled with some very stupid people.

I meant no offense to you and would accept people like you here anytime. That part was a joke.

It doesn't however change the fact that we have a ton of people moving here with that attitude though.

 

[WB9YZU]

See! I knew it! You just wanted another opening so you could rant on about how the US, and CA in particular, should be run like some chapter in R.A. Heinlein book.
Damn boy, go buy a life

 

[JohnX]

I didn't read all the babble...but in case it didn't get mentioned, this will really piss you off.

There is no 25 or 30 year law. The cutoff is 1975, and will remain there until a new law is passed.

 

[Rob Mayercik]

(I'd rather be cremated and shot out of a cannon anyhow.)

You DO realize that they are probably going to insist on a permit for that, right?

aperwork

Rob

 

[goodburbon]

the only thing I like about Louisiana....... $10 gets you an inspection sticker.

Oh and California is apparently doing something about leaf blowers. I was browsing recently in Lowes and happend across a blower with a rather large sticker "not for sale in California"

Jon, I find your statement "At least CA is finally going to start smogging Diesels and motorcycles..." a bit of a contradiction. If we want less harassment why are you satisfied that they are finally harassing someone else too?

 

[88-xj-laredo]

California pisses me off, they create all the friggin BS laws and then a bunch of other states have to accept them too, what is that crap? Damn, I'm glad I live in NH.

 

[5-90]

the only thing I like about Louisiana....... $10 gets you an inspection sticker.

Oh and California is apparently doing something about leaf blowers. I was browsing recently in Lowes and happend across a blower with a rather large sticker "not for sale in California"

Jon, I find your statement "At least CA is finally going to start smogging Diesels and motorcycles..." a bit of a contradiction. If we want less harassment why are you satisfied that they are finally harassing someone else too?

Not a contradiction - an observation borne of frustration.

I so often see Diesels (especially) belching out black smoke - but doing so without interference - that my being harrassed over my minimal tailpipe emissions seems self-defeating.

Frankly, I'd like to see everyone left alone. However, if they're going to bother people, then bother everyone, and not just a "mainstream" segment of the population - I find that discriminatory.

"Why can't they just treat us with benign neglect?" It's not that I'd like to see everything run "like a chapter in an R. A. Heinlein book" (although I'd take a cross between Heinlein and L. Neil Smith...) but I'm sick of government interference in bloody everything - and I'm most tired of the fact that it seems to be done without any actual thought or relevance to real-world occurrences. I think Orwell's duckspeak seems to apply to most of the elected idiots.

And no, I didn't vote for them. I'm a firm believer in the idea of "re-elect no-body!" and "career politician" should not be a possibility at any level.

No, more than anything else, I'm tired of not only "government interference" but "selective government interference" - if you're going to interfere in lives, might as well get them all. But, it would be far preferable to just leave everyone alone. If there are people who can't live without government intervention in their lives, I understand that Venezuela is rapidly joining the World Socialist Movement - move there!

 

[RichP]

I'm in one of the 4 remaining counties in PA that don't do the sniffer/double inspection sticker things and boy am I glad. From people I've talked to it can be a real racket. I think the nicest compliment I've ever gotten was from a customer of mine who owns a big shop. I overheard him say to the inspection guy 'you might as well just put a sticker on any of his jeeps he brings in here cause you won't find anything wrong with them' 'if you do find something I can almost bet he's already got an appointment to get if fixed cause he don't work outside in the winter anymore'.
I liked NJ though, the sniffers were run by the state at the state inspection stations which are drive thru types. They don't fool around, after sitting in line for 20 min or so they run you thru, stick the sniffer up the tailpipe and either pass or fail you, rechecks don't cost anything. Don't know if it's still the same though, that was 14 years ago but the stations still look the same, at least in Morristown.
Pa now is changing to the output of the OBD system, no sniffer or visual on OBD II and above, they just plug you in to the snapon box and printout the readings, done. They can't change any settings or use a judgement call or fudge the readings for an expensive BS repair, it's cut and dried.
Pretty much whatever state you go to they all have their 'thing' that is very annoying, PA used to have 2x a year inspections and that was a real PIA, Hawaii it was 2x's a year if the vehicle was over 10 years old.

 

[RichP]

Not a contradiction - an observation borne of frustration.
I so often see Diesels (especially) belching out black smoke - but doing so without interference - that my being harrassed over my minimal tailpipe emissions seems self-defeating.

Working in manhattan I have been seeing these new hybrid busses, gotta admit they sure seem much cleaner, no belching smoke and quiet as can be cept for the loud sigh they make when they kneel down and lift up to let handicapped on and off. I would actually love to have a solar car that I could leave in NJ and use to drive 6 miles to the train station, let sit all day and charge then drive 6 miles back to the family townhouse. Except for sunday nite going down and friday nite coming home I drive 60 miles a week now or 180 total counting down and back. I'm flat out digging taking the train except like the other nite coming home, I got engrossed in a book series I have been reading, the foreigner series by Cherya, damn if I didn't miss my station and have to go two towns up the line and get the next train back, it was one of those 'boy that looks just like my TJ we just passed in that station...oh S**** it was' LOL....

 

[dspilot]

If there are people who can't live without government intervention in their lives, I understand that Venezuela is rapidly joining the World Socialist Movement - move there!

Makes me wish I was a paying member just so I could have this as a sig.

 

[Glenn B]

Being in Midtown everyday, I have yet to see a smokey bus. Though I always hear the engine going on the hybrid busses. I do, on the other hand, see plenty of blue smoke belching Crown Vics. I guess they do not hold up as well as the (discontinued) Caprice? Bummer.

Working in manhattan I have been seeing these new hybrid busses, gotta admit they sure seem much cleaner, no belching smoke and quiet as can be cept for the loud sigh they make when they kneel down and lift up to let handicapped on and off. I would actually love to have a solar car that I could leave in NJ and use to drive 6 miles to the train station, let sit all day and charge then drive 6 miles back to the family townhouse. Except for sunday nite going down and friday nite coming home I drive 60 miles a week now or 180 total counting down and back. I'm flat out digging taking the train except like the other nite coming home, I got engrossed in a book series I have been reading, the foreigner series by Cherya, damn if I didn't miss my station and have to go two towns up the line and get the next train back, it was one of those 'boy that looks just like my TJ we just passed in that station...oh S**** it was' LOL....

 

[5-90]

Being in Midtown everyday, I have yet to see a smokey bus. Though I always hear the engine going on the hybrid busses. I do, on the other hand, see plenty of blue smoke belching Crown Vics. I guess they do not hold up as well as the (discontinued) Caprice? Bummer.

Don't even get me started on California "E-plates..."

dspilot - you can go ahead and use it, once you cough up the dues :wave: