Gen 4 New York State Inspection - Incomplete Readiness Tests

[Kevin M Melisz]

Looking for any help or advice from the community. I have a recently installed a complete (Full) Belanger exhaust on my 2008. After installation I have driven the car about 300 miles with no CEL. I went to take my car for its annual NYS inspection and failed for 2 incomplete readiness tests on Catalyst and O2 Monitors. In 2020 I passed NYS inspection with no issues. In NYS you are allowed 1 incomplete readiness monitor.

I have been told by local Dodge dealer to just drive it more, I have read everything online that I can find about getting these OBDII readiness test to be completed both generically and specific to Viper.

If anyone has any advice on how I can get this to pass in NYS or what I can check to ensure it will pass it would be greatly appreciated.

Thanks in advance.

 

[TexasViper35]

How is she on start up? By that I mean is there any hesitation to start at all?

I went through something similar a few years back and in my case it was that my battery was on its way out. So every time I started the car it cleared all of the memory and the car needed to be driven for quite awhile to relearn everything. And since I would turn it off to go in to get the inspection started, it only had a few minutes of run time (if that) by the technician before they connected it to the OBD. In my case a new battery and a 30 minute drive to relearn and store data was the solution. Good luck!

 

[redtanrt10]

Kevin, The newer G4 and G5 are really a hassle to read "ready"

I sold my G4 4 years ago, swap the ECU to Stock, and drove close to 300 miles and it still wasn't ready.

I finally found a Chrysler "drive cycle" recommendation and it cleared in about 20 miles

First, clear any CEL's. With your bellangers it's when, not if, the CEL will come on. You need to keep the rev's up. Lug the motor in 4th or 5th gear and you will eventually get a CEL.

Here's a Chrysler Drive Cycle recommendation. Make sure you have no CEL and follow this procedure Good luck, Mike

https://www.viperalley.com/attachments/chrysler-drive-cycle-information-obd2-pdf.150506/

 

[Dan Cragin]

I typically cannot get the Gen 4's to pass the catalyst monitor with the Belanger setup. If I change the location of the upstream O2 to the collector
and put a CARB approved catalyst in the system, I can get it to pass.
I like to use the factory secondary cats as they flow well and work good
enough to pass the catalyst monitor.

 

[diamond head]

Where in LA are you located? I have someone that can get the car to pass smog.

 

[Kevin M Melisz]

BYAIC, My battery is about 6 years old but sits on a tender during winter months and has never seemed weak or problems starting the car cold. I guess I could take it to a Autozone to have them run a check on the battery to make sure.

redtanrt10, I appreciate the advice I will try to the chrysler drive cycle recommendation and check to see if they are complete.

 

[TexasViper35]

BYAIC, My battery is about 6 years old but sits on a tender during winter months and has never seemed weak or problems starting the car cold. I guess I could take it to a Autozone to have them run a check on the battery to make sure.

redtanrt10, I appreciate the advice I will try to the chrysler drive cycle recommendation and check to see if they are complete.

My Mopar batteries have always gone bad literally the very month or so that they are warranted to reach, and my car gets driven almost daily, year round, here in Texas. These are 24-36 month batteries. The thing is car batteries don’t just die flat out, you will notice something “different” when starting, but it may be very subtle at first and then get progressively worse.

Too much info for this subject, but Walmart has superior battery testing equipment over Auto Zone or O’Reilys (auto part stores) and their test is also no charge. Don’t ask me how I know, it’s a long story.

It should not take 300 miles of driving for your car to recognize all of its systems. If you follow the instructions for about 20 - 30 minutes or so and then drive it straight to the inspection station (don’t shut it off) and have them plug in to your OBD everything should be reading properly. - If your battery has some issue.

 

[littlecaars]

Redtanrt is exactly right. There is a specific pattern and speed to the drive cycle that you must follow. I am confident if you do that you will clear the monitors. I owned a shop on long island with an inspection license. We would give the car back to the customer and explain what they had to do and usually when they came back, if there was no inherent problem with the car it would clear.

 

[Dan Cragin]

I was able to get Redtanrt to pass emissions with the stock computer and Belanger system, but the same car with a different owner cant get it too pass now as the cats
just are not working good enough. If you go through the proper drive cyle several times and the Cat monitor wont pass, odds are the cats are not working good enough.

 

[TexasViper35]

After 300 miles your car has seen all sorts of driving behavior and definitely should have reset all of it’s monitors if a Drive Cycle (or cycles) was going to do the trick, at least that’s the common belief. I remember researching for a Viper specific Drive Cycle after that episode I had with the failing battery while trying to pass inspection. I found a Drive Cycle online and used it, not too complicated.

I tried to find more info for you online, but people never posted back what their ultimate solution was in most instances, but this fellow did and it looks a lot like the Drive Cycle that I used. He also put 100’s of miles on his car without it fully getting reset before using this simple Drive Cycle. Go to post #7:

https://www.viperclub.org/vca/threads/dodge-viper-emissions-drive-cycle.663930/#post-3166273

Hopefully you’ve made progress and it’s not an issue any longer! Please post back so it can be helpful to others.

 

[Sennahnamrecken]

I am from NY and FL and have my 2008 SRT 10 registered in FL. The mandatory, annual State Inspection in NY State inspection is insane, and I am not surprised that older Vipers don't pass it.
I changed the battery of my car, just recently and had no issues with resets. She picked up, where I left her with the old battery. All I noticed is that the starting got better and quicker.

 

[Kevin M Melisz]

All, I just wanted to send the update/conclusion. My battery was 6-7 years old and I ended up replacing it just to make sure this wasn't causing the issue. After that I tried all the steps/procedures posted on line to get the O2 and Cat test completed. I had a scanner and would check each time and still incomplete. However after putting 600 miles on the car, some highway, some in town, some easy cruising and some hard driving I was able to get the test to complete. All the while I never had a CEL.

So if anyone is having any issue with getting their car to complete the emission tests without CEL's coming on, I would tell them to just keep driving the car / putting on miles.

Thank you all for the advice.