I'm in california and recently purchased a grey market 500sel. After initially failing smog, I took the car to a shop for a tune up. Failed again. Then it looked like valve seals were the problem, so I had them all replaced as well as the timing chain. The fuel distributor and all vacuum lines were checked and replaced if necessary as well.
After picking up the car when these repairs were complete I was very happy with the way the car ran. It ended up costing $3600 including all the parts I needed and labor. Great, I'll pass emissions for sure now...or so I thought. After 3 more smog checks and 4 more visits to the mechanic to get the car as clean as possible (running terribly lean), still it won't pass.
I don't know what to do with it now. I'm 6 grand into it including purchase price and repairs. The state won't pass it (because it's grey market, I have to go to a state run smog check station). The smog tech tells me this car will probably never pass because german spec engines aren't designed to pass here.
Now, my original mechanic tells me he can get a U.S. 560 engine for 2500 and probably install it for another 1000. WTF!? I originally told him I needed it to pass smog, and that's why I brought it to him. $3500 later he admits it will probably never pass after initially assuring me that the repairs would make it pass and then tries to sell me another engine with labor for an additional 3500!? I'm beyond frustrated with the car at this point. Actually, it's California's laws that frustrate me, not the car. It runs beautifully. What a shame. I'll have to park it in my driveway because I can't register it here.
Hi Maas, hi everyone, this is Andrew. wow some changes here I see!
Maas, the car being a grey market will contribute to the problem. It does not inherently have the smog control equipment attached to a US bound car.
I don't know if you had the O2 sensor checked. I would go that route for now simply because I had a problem getting my car to pass inspection a few months ago. And my 560 is US specs. After adjusting the lean/rich mixture, tunning the car and even using some pepboy garbage it got worse. Finnally I replaced the O2 sensor after having taken the car checked at the dealer. I would have done this diagnosis if I had known then how to do it. Now I know. Anyway the car passed with flying colors.
Get the CD while you are at it it will help you in the future to do most of the work yourself. For example, I just replaced all the fron wheel bearing on the car in less than 3 hours. The car does not hum after this it was great.
Maas you have spend a little fortune by now, don't just give up.
Let us know how you did.
The test results in CA are dont on HC (parts per million), CO (percent) and NO(PPM).
The Califonia maximums for this car are 117 PPM for HC, 0.75% for CO and 1082 PPM for NO. The best the car has done so far were 174 PPM HC, 0.45% CO and 1256 PPM NO. This was before I had the top-end work done. After, I went back and got the following results: 430 PPM HC, 6.05% CO (!), and 356 PPM NO.
These cars (grey market this year) don't use and O2 sensor, and there is no place to plug one in on the car's computer even if I welded one in. My next step is to try replacing the catalytic converter. A new one should show up tomorrow (just ordered from germanstar.net). This is my last hope. If I still fail I'll park the car until I move to another state in a few years.
On another note, I figured out how to put the car into first gear start mode last night and was very surprised at the acceleration!
You know, the worst thing about California is their policy toward grey-market vehicles. There is no cost-ceiling for repairs for these cars and no waiver availablity. I drove the car all weekend and thoroughly enjoyed it. Too bad. I did replace the cat. converter on Friday and the exhaust smells noticeably cleaner. Maybe I'll try again soon.
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