I just got an '03 TDI, which according to CO law, I have to run through emissions every year. Cars '04 and newer only have to go every other year. Anyone know if it's hard to pass the CO test? Ever have to do mods or anything to pass? Any additives or tricks that help? The car is bone stock, and doesn't appear to be smokier than others (though it smokes like crazy after a real cold start). Any tips much appreciated.
Colorado Emissions Test
- Thread starter Conan
- Start date
bluesmoker
Veteran Member
get a vag com or a friend with this program and recalibrate the egr
http://www.tdiclub.com/TDIFAQ/TDiFAQ-7.html#j
this will dramatically reduce the smoke, opacity etc
http://www.tdiclub.com/TDIFAQ/TDiFAQ-7.html#j
this will dramatically reduce the smoke, opacity etc
UFO
Veteran Member
Colorado test is easy, just warm it up well first. And DON'T mess with the EGR, reducing the level increases the chance of the ECU throwing out a code, then you WILL fail the test.
Koreth
Well-known member
The CO emissions test is easy to pass. Make sure that you have no codes set, and that the engine is warm so it isn't running excessively rich and thus extra smokey.
UFO
Veteran Member
A tester out in Parker remarked to me it's harder to pass the colder the weather is, so take advantage of this week.
Thanks UFO. I just moved from Parker to Englewood. I just have the paper license plate now-- do you know if I have to go through emissions when I get my real plates? I got the car from a dealer, and I don't remember seeing anything in the paperwork regarding the emissions check.
I used the guy in Aurora (shaddy location) and i don't believe he really tested anything. Never saw my car move from my parking spot as i ate lunch across the street.
One tip is call the place before you go as the two closest to me couldn't test VW's as they don't have enough ground clearance to get over the rollers that are designed for big diesel trucks.
Yes; you have to hand the paper work from the emission place to the DMV trolls. They want your driver license, proof of insurance, proof you passed emissions, Bill of sale from the dealer (small pink/red paper), and your money.
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UFO
Veteran Member
Correct.
I heard somewhere that a dealer is required to do the emissions test on any used car they sell. I don't remember that in the transaction. If it's the law, I'll take it back to the stealer in the springs and have them do it.
You are correct; in the State of Colorado a used auto dealer has to test/prove that the car will pass emissions. Unfortunately the emission test cannot be transferred to the new owner. The dealer cannot test its own cars and with diesels their is only like 15 places throughout the State that can test small car diesels (list below). Your wasting your time going back to the dealer.
http://www.cdphe.state.co.us/ap/down/dieselstationrates.pdf
dieseltwitch
Veteran Member
Do like me and reg your car to someones address who lives out in the country and you done have to get it tested at all! lol say good by to the emission testing lol.
UFO
Veteran Member
The dealer will basically give you a voucher good for the cost of the test.
New law that requires you to license any new vehicale you purchase to the address on your driver license for the 1st year. Stupid RV A-holes where running scams with fake business address's in Montona and Wyoming to avoid taxes on their $100K+ RV's so the State changed the rules on new vehicale purchases to protect their tax flow.
You can switch it after the 1st year.
Not to hijack my own thread but... I used to live in AZ, where registration fees are astronomical. I was renewing my tags at the DMV one time, and asked what were the most expensive plates they had sold. The agent said that one time she saw a Bluebird motor home with plates that cost $6000 a year! If you look at RVs around the country, you'll notice that a lot of them are registered in Oregon (or at least that was the case at one time). People just get an address there, just for the cheap plates.
I took my Jetta in for the emissions test today, and was told by the 'tech' at the place that in CO the dealer is required by law to pay for the emissions on a used car sold by them. I asked a dealer about it, and they said they had never heard that. I want to make sure I don't dish out my own cash, expecting to be reimbursed, and get screwed by the dealer. Anyone know the law on this? I'm not getting any good solid info on the law online.
UFO
Veteran Member
It's true, the seller is required by law to pay for the emissions test. But that will not save you from unscrupulous dealers. Most of the time they will just give you a voucher. But that typically only works for the gasoline vehicles. I went back to my dealer (idiot) who took back the voucher and issued me a check for the amount of the diesel test.
UFO
Veteran Member
They don't care if you have a muffler, but if your cat is missing, automatic fail.
The sales manager agreed (over the phone) to reimburse me for the test. He claimed that it should be $25, and had never heard of the law about the seller having to reimburse. Really, how could you be the sales manager of a big dealership and not know that?
UFO
Veteran Member
$25 is close to the cost for a gasser treadmill test. For a diesel test, it's more like $40-$60. Yeah, that's a good one, him claiming to be ignorant of a law that affects him directly and every day.
Man, am I pissed. I just went and paid $45 for the emissions test, and failed it HARD. 35% is the maximum opacity, and I got 48% under load. I generally drive it pretty hard, but I had to get it over there in near rush-hour traffic. So it was warm, but not properly 'tuned up'. It's the dealer's responsibility to make it pass, but I don't trust them as far as I can throw them, and they are 60 miles away. I never wanted them to touch this car again. Guess I'll just try to give it a 'tune up', and pay another fifty bucks (having to take at least another half-day off of work to do it), to see if it worked. Argh!
Update. I thought maybe the problem was that the car was stone cold when I left home, and I got it warmed up but not much more on the way to the emissions place. So I decided to really 'blow the cobwebs out', and try it today. Unfortunately, I could only find one diesel emissions place that was open today, near Boulder. I really can't afford to take any more time off of work to take care of it during the week-- it had to be today.
I drove it from my house in the middle of metro Denver, warmed it up carefully, then proceeded to give it about 45 minutes of 'Italian Tune-up'. Typical move is to run 2000 RPM in fifth, WOT until I need to slow down or get a ticket. I went to an under-construction industrial park and simulated drag racing. I have heard that it puts the turbo under a lot of strain to go WOT from low revs, so most of my runs were 2K to 4200 under WOT. There wasn't a whole lot of traffic on the Boulder Turnpike, so I'd slow down to about 40MPH with nobody around, and just gun it until I hit traffic, usually around 85MPH. I definitely hit sustained max boost at least twenty times on the way to the emissions place.
In Colorado, the only emissions requirement for diesels is that it have no more than 35% opacity at 40, 50, and 60 MPH under load. My readings yesterday were 48%, 41%, and 37% respectively. The tech ran the tests again, with the same results. So, how well did my 'tune ups' work? I paid $70 at the Boulder tester to find out. First test: 45%@40, 37%@50, and 33%@60. Okay. He ran the test again. 49%@40, 36%@50, and 38%@60. Fail HARD, again. So, I've spent $105 to flunk the test twice in two days. 'Italian Tune-up' didn't fix whatever's wrong with this car. The weird thing is that I was standing right behind the car for all four tests, and saw very little visible smoke. The guy right after me today has exactly the same car, down to year, nozzles, and color. His smoked like a freight train, and he PASSED!! ***?!
I'm going to read up on this here at the club, and see if I can find something to get my car to smoke less. Unfortunately, I modified mine (PP520 nozzles with low-smoke set-up), so tossing it in the dealer's lap is not an option. Argh.
I drove it from my house in the middle of metro Denver, warmed it up carefully, then proceeded to give it about 45 minutes of 'Italian Tune-up'. Typical move is to run 2000 RPM in fifth, WOT until I need to slow down or get a ticket. I went to an under-construction industrial park and simulated drag racing. I have heard that it puts the turbo under a lot of strain to go WOT from low revs, so most of my runs were 2K to 4200 under WOT. There wasn't a whole lot of traffic on the Boulder Turnpike, so I'd slow down to about 40MPH with nobody around, and just gun it until I hit traffic, usually around 85MPH. I definitely hit sustained max boost at least twenty times on the way to the emissions place.
In Colorado, the only emissions requirement for diesels is that it have no more than 35% opacity at 40, 50, and 60 MPH under load. My readings yesterday were 48%, 41%, and 37% respectively. The tech ran the tests again, with the same results. So, how well did my 'tune ups' work? I paid $70 at the Boulder tester to find out. First test: 45%@40, 37%@50, and 33%@60. Okay. He ran the test again. 49%@40, 36%@50, and 38%@60. Fail HARD, again. So, I've spent $105 to flunk the test twice in two days. 'Italian Tune-up' didn't fix whatever's wrong with this car. The weird thing is that I was standing right behind the car for all four tests, and saw very little visible smoke. The guy right after me today has exactly the same car, down to year, nozzles, and color. His smoked like a freight train, and he PASSED!! ***?!
I'm going to read up on this here at the club, and see if I can find something to get my car to smoke less. Unfortunately, I modified mine (PP520 nozzles with low-smoke set-up), so tossing it in the dealer's lap is not an option. Argh.
bluesmoker
Veteran Member
you need more air and less fuel, adjust your iq with vag com, turn down the egr also
http://tdiclub.com/TDIFAQ/TDiFAQ-7.html#j
http://tdiclub.com/TDIFAQ/TDiFAQ-7.html#h
and your intake may be clogged
http://tdiclub.com/TDIFAQ/TDiFAQ-7.html#g
and lastly is your cat converter intact?
http://tdiclub.com/TDIFAQ/TDiFAQ-7.html#j
http://tdiclub.com/TDIFAQ/TDiFAQ-7.html#h
and your intake may be clogged
http://tdiclub.com/TDIFAQ/TDiFAQ-7.html#g
and lastly is your cat converter intact?
Thanks for the tips. I don't have a VCDS (yet), and the problem with having the guru tweak it is that I have to pay $45-$70 a pop to see if the tweaks worked. Having a shop with their own opacity tester would be awesome. Here's my plan: soapy-water test all intake plumbing, in case I have an air leak. Fix it if I do. Then take it to a particular tester that is rumored to be lenient. See if I can get them to agree to give me a second test later in the day if I fail at first. If I do fail, jam over to the guru's shop and have him recalibrate my EGR, and turn down the IQ, and/or do whatever he thinks is best to turn the smoke down. Then jam back over to the tester, and pass.
Does anybody know if the testers are required to give you a 'do-over' if you fail the first time? That would help. I think I'm in the wrong line of work. I'd love to be able to charge someone $70 to shine a flashlight through their exhaust...
Does anybody know if the testers are required to give you a 'do-over' if you fail the first time? That would help. I think I'm in the wrong line of work. I'd love to be able to charge someone $70 to shine a flashlight through their exhaust...
tivoKlr
Veteran Member
high IQ and biodiesel
If you max out your IQ with the VCDS it will smoke less. If you have to you could hammer mod the pump and really clean up the smoke. You could make it smoke free I would imagine.
You need the VCDS. Somebody around you has to have one. You're going to have to go through this every year too, so having the tools to modify your car to pass emissions is a must.
If you want it to pass you're going to have to put a bit of effort into decreasing the fueling. It'd probably have passed with the stock injector nozzles...
I've also heard people have success using biodiesel to help clean up the smoke for emissions testing purposes.
However, I will say, this is one of many things I love about living in Eagle County as I don't have to deal with any of this crap and can run rich all day long...sorry.
If you max out your IQ with the VCDS it will smoke less. If you have to you could hammer mod the pump and really clean up the smoke. You could make it smoke free I would imagine.
You need the VCDS. Somebody around you has to have one. You're going to have to go through this every year too, so having the tools to modify your car to pass emissions is a must.
If you want it to pass you're going to have to put a bit of effort into decreasing the fueling. It'd probably have passed with the stock injector nozzles...
I've also heard people have success using biodiesel to help clean up the smoke for emissions testing purposes.
However, I will say, this is one of many things I love about living in Eagle County as I don't have to deal with any of this crap and can run rich all day long...sorry.
UFO
Veteran Member
Gasser emissions tests get a do-over. You need to check with the DMV to see if it applies to diesels. It should, but I never have had to do a diesel test over.
Curkkic
Veteran Member
i dont know colorados laws off hand but emissions testing should be local wiht in 30 miles. if its not theres options about getting exempted from having to smog it. check with your local laws