Failed MOT emissions test on bangernomics car, solutions?

I’d be surprised if it wasn’t up to temperature, I wince when I take my 32 year old turbocharged car to an mot place and they leave it idling for 1/2 hour. The heat soak actually causes it to start running richer according to o2 sensor. A good thrash and the oil warm is what you want.

The oil takes roughly twice as long to warm up than the coolant.

Yeah, get it through it’s MOT then slowly get back to the important business of reducing air quality in your neighbourhood.

In what way do you think the car is contributing to poor local air quality?

Two things – as per everyone except one above it is far better to keep an older car running (even if exhaust emissions are a bit high when it’s engine is cold) than it is to scrap it, mine and refine all the raw materials for a new one, especially electric (just google lithium mining!) ship said material half way around the world, build a new car in a factory powered by yet more fossil fuels then ship the finished product halfway around the world again and gain what, 5mpg?

Main point which may help the OP – my old petrol Hyundai failed the MOT on emissions a few years ago, a bottle of Redex in the tank and it sailed through the retest. It’s also a faily easy job to clean out the air intakes and filter and that will help, no mechanical skill required at all (do petrols have an EGR? The one on my current Transit was filing the intakes with tar and soot, ran much better when cleaned out, EGR now blanked off and that’s passed every emissions test with flying colours, although has mostly failed the MOT on rust…)

<p>Yes, petrol cars have EGR’s but not at that age. Blocking and passing emissions means nothing, NOX’s aren’t tested, cost me £80 and a couple of hours to put a new one in my C8, now have the old one to get cleaned out and kept as a spare.</p>

Yea, blanking the EGR is a bit of a dick thing to do, it solves the problem of a blocked EGR but then the engine has to run without it.

It’s like blanking off your sewer pipe and just diverting shit into the neighbours garden because you had a blocked drain.

They’re not even expensive parts, stripping and cleaning is probably cost effective at home but a new one is usually only £50-£150 which isn’t going to impact on all but the most economic of bangernomic budgets.

Even at that mine was sticky more than jammed. If you leave it for ages it will bake open and burn out the valve seat but otherwise it just takes a good clean with carb cleaner to free them up. I’ll probably chuck mine in the ultrasonic bath at work once the worst is out.

Changed the oil today, the air filter was very clean, put some posh petrol in and some of that cleaning additive, took for a long drive Italian tune-up holding in higher gears to blow the cobwebs out. Will give it a long hard drive to make sure it’s thoroughly warmed up  before it goes back for the re-test tomorrow, fingers crossed.

 I wince when I take my 32 year old turbocharged car to an mot place

32 years old?  WTF are you driving, a Mk4 RS Turbo?

A 1986 944 turbo. Speaking of which, I took it for an MOT today and it chose that moment for the starter to jam. I have a spare but understandably the garage won’t fit customer supplied parts, the recovery company will only take it to the nearest mot station, which is where it already is.

Looking like a big bill as  a new starter is around £300 or pay for a low loader home as the MOT has expired.

Good luck with your MOT op.

Aren’t you allowed to drive a car with no mot to and from a test?

You are, but it won’t start.

Yes.

But he has to start the engine first!

(Clue. Starter jammed).

@jamesoz. Can’t you get somebody to tow you home?

Must admit I  hadn’t thought of that, too busy being annoyed.

Push start it

OP,

I normally add a quarter of 2T  motorbike engine oil to my 2005 Toyota Corolla automatic whenever I top up my petrol (£20 each time), and I have been adding 2T oil for 7 years now since my friend recommended me.

If you dare you might want to try it after all it is a Toyota.

Me mate in far east add 2T to all his cars/4×4 (most of his cars/4×4 are Toyota) regardless of whether they diesel or petrol.

🙂

p/s: adding 2t motorbike engine oil to the fuel …

Give the solenoid on the starter motor a whack to free it off

We tried, there’s not a lot of space with customers cars coming in and out. I also jacked it up and tried the old hit the starter while the key was turned trick.

I’ll try and find a volunteer that’s available during the open hours tomorrow.

Chewkw – we don’t have the shit watered down fuel you get in Philippines/Indonesia, 2 stroke oil is probably not doing much to help out other than making the mixture lean and shafting the catalytic converter.

Chewkw – we don’t have the shit watered down fuel you get in Philippines/Indonesia, 2 stroke oil is probably not doing much to help out other than making the mixture lean and shafting the catalytic converter.

I am using it here in the UK by mixing it with the petrol … 🙂

Has it passed……….?

Need to know.

We need to know!

In other news I opted pay the garage to fit a shiny new starter and chalk it up to experience.

The garage have been very helpful and informed me the car should pass depending on brakes and emissions.

The price is good and it hopefully saves me a lot of arse ache, not to mention crawling about under a car eating rust and grease in the pissing rain.

Sorry for delay, it passed, all okay now. Oil change, posh petrol, a bit of additive and some long drives to warm it up properly did the job so good for another year at minmal cost. Thanks for your help all!

👌

Result!

Excellent !

This place is still helpful …

Excellent! Obviously you must flog yourself with organic sustainably sourced birch nightly to atone for the terrible damage that you are doing by not discarding this tonne and a half of highly manufactured, completely fit for purpose devil machine to replace it with a slightly less polluting tonne and a half highly manufactured wündermachine…

Nice, everybody loves a happy ending.

My 4 wheeled planet killer managed a co of 1.4% and hc of 104. Fine for a non cat 3L eighties car.

I’d forgotten how quickly it can turn an eighty litre tank of Shells finest into fire, noise and worrying smells.