is there anyone out there who can help me out. Know how to turn the thing off...or does inspections? I'm going to be in raleigh tomorrow evening and i can meet you somewhere or something...i just odn't have to money to be fixing my car and buying a plane ticket home to Seattle...ya know?

12/8/2005 2:19:27 PM

here's the Catch-22...you will have to get to the root of the problem that is causing the CEL to illuminate, or you still won't be able to pass inspection.

First of all, any major shop can clear the codes, and even Advance Auto Parts can do it. HOWEVER...you have to drive the car for a minimum number of drive cycles (start, warm-up, shut down) before you can technically hook up to the car to perform an inspection after the reset is done.

And my guess is that the CEL will illuminate again by then. You need to find out which error codes are being flagged and then take corrective measures.

Now you can go about doing this two ways:

1) Go to Advance Auto Parts and have them pull the codes for you. Then either replace parts yourself or have somebody inexpensive (like myself) do the work for you. This solution requires effort on your part and more time...but will be cheaper.

2) Take it to a shop, suck it up, and fork over the money to have them take care of it ALL. You don't lift a finger except to take it there. Obviously, this means DOLLA.

What kind of car do you have? For anything Japanese I recommend my friend Rex Deffenbaugh at Happy Jap's in Cary. Their number is 467-2884. They don't do inspections, but Rex is good and reasonable.

12/8/2005 2:32:39 PM