Tell Us about SB100 Today
 

The SB100 traffic has been somewhat low this season. Let us know how it goes today.
Did everyone get a number?

Hello All,

Curious people in California are watching...last year the numbers lasted into May, a reflection of the economy.

Tony R.

Well, I walked into my DMV, Oceanside, Ca. and may as well have been chased out with a stick.

My Cobra is titled as a (Yr Model, 1965) (Make, Ford) (Yr 1st Sold, 0000).

I splained to the nice lady that I had been told I needed to file for an SB100 number or some such thing, since my car was made from a kit some time in the mid 90's and I heard I needed to get my registration corrected.

She said "no you don't".

After some very polite "splaining", I asked if she could inquire to her supervisor since my request had something to do with a recent law change and an amnesty program was involved. She returned shortly and said " Your vehicle was and is legally registered, have a nice day".

Find another office.

Root canal work has now officially become a more painless alternative to a visit to any non-informed CA DMV office.

Wow! Not much news on the SB100 front so far.

Send/call Robert Morgester (CA AG) and/or Steve McDonald (SEMA), splaining that you've been denied access to the amnesty program, then sit back and watch them jump into action...

Robert Morgester
916-445-9330
Robert.Morgester@doj.ca.gov

Steve McDonald
202-783-0864
stevem@sema.org

Thanks for starting this thread. I guess it's as good a place as any to summarize my whole SB-100 experience.

Oh, wait, the important part: I have my number in hand! :D :D :D

707 was delivered to me in mid-October with two years' previous registration in Massachusetts, but no plates. I drove it for 15 days or so on the theory that "foreign" cars are allowed to drive for 20 days on their existing tags. I'm not sure that would have held up but it was my prepared excuse should I have been pulled over. It was never an issue.

On my first visit to the DMV (Carmichael office) I had no problems starting the registration and (despite being told TOPs were not usually given out for these vehicles) getting a 60-day TOP. On later inspection, there were several errors on the registration, but they were corrected by the CHP inspection and it was only a minor bobble.

The next week, based on favorable reports from local owners, I made an appointment at the Folsom DMV office. I went mostly to get the DMV inspection and to make contact with the crew there. It was a disaster. The vehicle inspector was so physically limited she may as well have been in a wheelchair - could not bend to see the VIN plate (or stretch to see the plate on the pickup truck next to me). She filled out the verification with so many errors and misspellings ("Corba") that it was worthless, and the supervisor I spoke with barely seemed to know what SB-100 was.

I got my brake and light checks at Kniesel's Automotive in Citrus Heights, no problems.

I got my CHP inspection at the Date Avenue office (Madison/80). The inspecting officer, J. Craven, was very polite and organized and emphasized that DMV might question some of his data, but he had carefully followed the procedures he had been using for three years and was certain he'd done it correctly.

I had ordered my custom plates (GUMBAAL - :D) and they came in, so I had an appointment at the Carmichael DMV on 12/29. I went in - could not get plates with an incomplete registration. Almost as an afterthought, I asked about my SB-100 status. The clerk handed me over to the supervisor, Nancy, who went over my paperwork and found a major error - Officer Craven had entered 2006 as the model year and it HAS to be "0000"! To my absolute astonishment, she called Craven in and he came to the office for reeducation and to rewrite my verification. So I walked out, almost shaking because I was so glad I had decided to raise the issue - it would have been a disaster had I waited until today.

That killed any idea of going to the Folsom office for the certificate number. I went back and forth about how early to get to the Carmichael office and finally went at 6:30. I was alone there for 15 minutes, and then people started trickling in. By 8:00 there were 60-70 people in line. Nancy came out and round up the 5 SB-100 folks and took us to one clerk who took and organized our papers. (The clerk actually reached out to me at the back of the pack - never be TOO polite in these situations, grumble - and said, "Give me yours, I know they're ready to go." Then she fumbled with everyone else's pile of scraps.)

So at 8:15 I was waiting patiently. It was nearly 9:30 before Nancy came back with the packets - two of us had our numbers, the other three had problems ranging from no VIN (on a Porsche replica) to faulty titles. She told me she had gotten through to the desk in Sac right away, and then gotten cut off. 55 minutes of dialing later she was still not reconnected. I think she called a friend downtown and got the SB-100 desk to call her back.

And I have SPCNS 2010-242 in hand - now all I have to do is wait for the original certificate in the mail. That number is scary-high to me, given how prepared I was and how early my processing started. I don't think numbers will be available past this week, this year.

Soooo...

1. Read the SB-100 requirements carefully.
2. Get your registration started early, no later than September/October.
3. Get the brake and light certificates.
4. Get your CHP inspection and VIN issuance (if needed - they used my prior MA VIN tag). You will need to make an appointment and it will likely be 4-6 weeks out.
5. Make an appointment and take all your paperwork to the DMV by early December to get it reviewed and checked by an SB-100 expert. Make sure they say you are ready to go, that they would/will issue you your sequence number based on the packet you are holding.
6. Get to your chosen DMV office as early as you can on the first business day of the year. 2011 will likely be a busy year given that 2010 is an amnesty year - so 6:00 may not be too early. If the office is savvy, they will collect everyone seeking an SB-100 and handle them separately, so your place in line is not too important, just be in line... and towards the head of the line wouldn't hurt. I could have been an hour later but it was worth the time to stand there and admire the clouds.
7. Be polite to everyone - DMV clerks, CHP inspector, etc. - and it will pay dividends. I was prepared and polite and made some humorous remarks about being patient, and the clerk and supervisor went out of their way to do things for me. This, while snarling, full-fanged, at others who tried to be bossy or complain. I walked out with my wonderful, wonderful sequence number... and realized I hadn't asked for a new TOP. So I went back in, waited politely for the same clerk, and asked to see Nancy - who took about three seconds to tell the clerk to give me a TOP, chop-chop!

One important note is that my car's prior registration was neither here nor there - they didn't want the MA title, registration, anything and it was treated as if I'd just built it. So the warnings about mileage (too few miles to qualify as used, etc.) were irrelevant.

Happy to answer any questions. Even happier to recommend Kniesel's for the inspections, the Date Avenue CHP office for the VIN check, and Nancy at the Carmichael DMV for all questions and assistance.

2010-242. What a LOVELY number. :D

Congrats Gunner!!

Based on the info that the DMV provided, the numbers that are issued by Sac are somewhat random, so you could get a high number and actually be one of the first numbers issued.

Glad to hear the mileage issue was a not an issue at all. It is an issue if you're trying to register a regular production vehicle or motorcycle in CA that has low miles.

Got it!
 

I wasn't too afraid of not getting a number due to 2009 numbers but the amnesty thing had me worried. I arrived at the Laguna Hills office (Superformance's 'home DMV') at 4:45AM. There was another guy there in his car with 2 chairs chained to the post up front (since 3AM). I asked him if he was there for SB-100 (of course) and said yes. He offered the second chair to me. He was a Beck Spider guy and really on top of his stuff. Believe it or not, by 6 AM there were about 15 people in line, only 3 (for the whole day) for SB-100. Surprised to see people wait hours in advance for other DMV reasons (and I thought we were weird).
Doors open, they take us 3 (one of which had the first SPF Grand Sport) and got to work. Then the clerk says that she can't me and Grand Sport a number because we don't have our B&L or CHP yet. WHAT????!!!! After a little careful explanation, some from Bob at Hillbank, she said she would call Sacramento to find out. Was this call for the numbers or only info? We were freakin. We could hear the busy signals on the PA for over an hour. She gets through and comes back after 15 minutes. She tells the Beck Spider guy, "YOU got a number", emphasis on 'YOU'. I thought I was in trouble. Ended up having numbers for us too and TOP's till end of March! Phew! Well, I still have lots to due but the biggest hurdle is jumped.
Many thanks to 'Got the Bug' and 'Rodknock' for their help. I hope to help others next year.
rodneym

Congrats Gunner & Rodney!

I had problems too way back in 2008. I documented them here on CC. Essentially they mixed up my paperwork with someone else's who was building a GT40. Anyway, my certificate went to his house in Saratoga. There's a long thread on it here trying to get everything corrected, but all in all, I don't think it's that hard of a process, IF you go through an experienced DMV.

So Gunner, let me ask you a few questions:

Was your car previously titled as a 1965 or whatever? And you had to go through all this AGAIN? Doesn't CA recognize prior titling?

I've got an even more interesting question though. When I bought CSX4005LA it came with a CA title as a 65 Shelby Cobra. This had happened some time in 2008 as I bought it in Jan 2009. It came from Mexico so someone did some legwork to get this done. That title legitimized my registration in CO as a 65 as well...

So now, let's say I sell it to someone in CA. Does having a previous SB100 count? Or do they have to start all over again?

You guys need to have a revolt and start your meddling government over again. Flush 'em. Any process this complex that requires you to find well-trained or sympathetic employees is bad legislation and needs to be fixed. If you can't go to 5 (let alone 2) different offices and present the same data and get exactly the same answer, something is broken.

The simple answer. Yes. Once titled in another state, the car has surrendered its SB100 exemption.

The information I got varied (on lots of points) but in the end, no, CA didn't care if MA had previously registered the vehicle. It might have been different if for some reason I did not need a smog exemption, but for SB-100 CA started from a clean sheet of paper and the MSO.

There is confusion on this point. I believe that as long as the vehicle is registered in CA (even through successive owners) the exemption is permanent. If you register the vehicle elsewhere, recent discussion indicates that this invalidates the SB-100 and it has to be reacquired. I don't know if that's the final word or not.

Well... without defending the situation, I'll simply note that a state with 35 million people, hundreds of major industries and some of the most desirable living space in the world *might* need more complex government than a largely rural state with one-tenth the population. :)

ADDENDUM: I just called the California BAR referee and was told, a bit wearily, that I *have* to have the original certificate in hand before I can make an appointment. I thought perhaps I could schedule in anticipation of the cert, but nope.

I don't care. I gots me that 60-day. :)

Ditto, there were about 70 people by 8 and only five were SB-100. The wait times at the DMV are so bad now you only have three choices: Make an appointment that will likely be 2-3 weeks out (very convenient if you can wait that long; it pays to plan ahead) in which case you'll be done in less than an hour; or prepare to wait for 2-4 hours to get to a clerk; or get there an hour before opening and spend maybe an hour and a half total.

Being able to do most routine stuff online helps a lot.

The requirement to have the certificate in hand before scheduling the appointment with the BAR has been in place since day 1 with SB100. It should take about 2 weeks to arrive.

Well, I thought it was worth a try... :rolleyes:

In the past, I've never heard of any DMV office that required that the CHP and B&L check be completed prior to issuing an SB100 sequence number. That being said, if you can get it done it's probably one less think to worry about.

Congratulations, Gunner

Maurice