One more year!

Woo hoo!

My beater car is a '95 Sunfire with a chronic, yet sporadic MIL. In Atlanta, if your MIL is on, you can't pass emissions no matter how clean it blows out the tail pipe. No pass emissions, no tag and no drive OR sell in the metro area. I noticed that some days the light is on, some days it is not. This morning it was on all the way to work, and still on when I went to lunch. It wasn't until I was sitting at a red light on the way back from lunch that I noticed the light wasn't on! I made a bee line to the nearest gas station, hoping it would have an emissions stand. My luck held and the place was not only open, but could test it right then. I kind of fidgeted while the old man did all the tests silently. Finally he handed me the print out and it gave me a pass in all areas! The fools!

As almost a sign of relief, or almost like taking a breath after being underwater for a minute, the MIL came on immediately after I started the car to leave. I just folded up the "Passed" certificate, patted the car's dash board, and drove back to work, grinning like an idiot.

It may be ugly, but it gets 27mpg and the A/C blows cold. When it dies someday I'll have a quiet service on the side of the road, pull the fuses, siphon the gas, pull the plate and walk away smiling.....

Those intermittent CEL's are indeed a pain in the arse. I've had the same thing on my S15 (GMC) for the last year too, but with longer gaps between cycles.

My tags are due in February (also in metro Atlanta), but late last November the light was off, I was next to a check-station and had the cash in my pocket; the test was done even though it was several months away from the due date.

When the tags were due three months later, the tag office droids either never noticed a months-old test receipt or it was still within some unknown time limit.

Darn thing went through the system like Courtney Love through blow/crack/meth/et al......

That was a good day.

I'm happy to deal with a CEL cause in my vocabulary a MIL is a mother-in-law, and that is a whole nother subject.

There's a silly easy way to solve all your CEL problems forever... pull the bulb!

And ya, what is "MIL"? Nothing I can think of with those letters fits.

Jay wrote: There's a silly easy way to solve all your CEL problems forever... pull the bulb!

Won't work in an area that requires testing on vehicles less than twenty-five years old. The testers won't trust the absence of a CEL so the vehicle still gets a scan.

Interestingly, my 86 Prelude always manages to throw a PGM-FI warning light during its' annual test, but still passes. The good thing is that the tester(s) never make an issue of it - the test numbers say "it's good" so they take the money, give me the print-out and say "see you when you bring back the truck/Civic", or "See you next year".

MIL= malfunction indicator light

I had a '94 Ranger that once it passed about 85,000 miles had an intermittent "check engine light". Luckily, while Memphis is on the list of areas close to failing air quality standards, when you get your car smog checked, they don't look inside your vehicle....yet. If it passes the "sniffer test" you pass. However, the city only has 3 approved test sites and the lines are almost always long...so you may enter the line okay but by the time you get to the front, may have a MIL.

I also had an '82 J2000 that developed an intermittent MIL, it turned out the maintenance needed was a rebuilt alternator. Just before it crapped itself big time, ALL the dashbord lights started winking on and off randomly....very disconcerting as you are driving down the street.

My '92 Integra? Manages to pass the annual test by a very wide margin, my B18 engined Civic CX did too.

i just deal with my air bag light on half the time, and my "door ajar" light as well.