CA - SPCN reg update

[RodKnock]

Originally Posted by Excaliber

As I am considering a move to California I will be watching this closely. The current registration process is so daunting it is a major deterent factor.

Now there's a man with his priorities straight. Choose your future destination based upon the ease or difficulty of his Cobra's registration process. Obviously, you're not married or the choice would have been made for you.

Ernie, while I haven't completed the entire process (the rest should be easy), the "SB100 gauntlet" is really not that hard, although mine was made a little more difficult than the other 499 registrations in 2008. In the end.

[Morgester]

Remember I am not DMV and it is DMV who decides how to implement the laws as they currently exist in California. The only reason I am involved in this process is to deal with the resulting registration fallout that follows our office’s prosecutions of illegal registration services. Our goal is to place the registered owner in a position they would have been had they registered the vehicle legally.

Here we have two rules at issue "full faith and credit" and the SPCN rule. In the past we have seen DMV Field Offices use the “full faith and credit” to issue a year on a SPCN that allowed it to be smog exempt. DMV’s main office is now looking at the issue and it appears that they will register the vehicles but the vehicles still have to comply with SPCN emission standards – SB100 or pass an emission test for the year of the build.
To be candid these vehicles should meet SPCN emission rules. The use of “full faith and credit” to avoid emissions is at best an unfortunate unintended consequence or simply does not apply to emission testing. DMV is now looking like they will take the position that “full faith and credit” doesn’t apply to emission testing.

So my free advice (worth what you paid for it) – don’t do it. If you choose to do it make sure you disclose everything and then DMV will do whatever DMV will do. Of course if you don’t like what DMV does on this issue there are administrative remedies available to you that you will have to win prior to your vehicle being registered.

Final note, if the amnesty bill makes it through and SEMA’s “greenrod” after market kit allows SPCN to meet current emission testing standards I plan on offering legislation to put to rest the “full faith and credit” issue so that it is clear it does not apply to emission testing. I like things simply, one set of rules that apply to everyone and that are enforced equally and fairly.

The plan is simply – consistent rules that allow hot rods and SPCN to be legally registered in California. Once in place our targeted registration services lose around 90% of their revenue and it will no longer be cost effective for them to remain in business. Without the funding from you folks these services will not be around to register those other vehicles (stolen / lemon / Katrina . . .)

The best way to get a bad law repealed is to enforce it strictly.
-- Abraham Lincoln

[Got the Bug]

Originally Posted by Morgester

Remember I am not DMV and it is DMV who decides how to implement the laws as they currently exist in California. The only reason I am involved in this process is to deal with the resulting registration fallout that follows our office’s prosecutions of illegal registration services. Our goal is to place the registered owner in a position they would have been had they registered the vehicle legally.

Here we have two rules at issue "full faith and credit" and the SPCN rule. In the past we have seen DMV Field Offices use the “full faith and credit” to issue a year on a SPCN that allowed it to be smog exempt. DMV’s main office is now looking at the issue and it appears that they will register the vehicles but the vehicles still have to comply with SPCN emission standards – SB100 or pass an emission test for the year of the build.

Mr Morgester,

Which governmental entity is responsible for investigating illegal registrations and forwarding them to your office for prosecution? If the DMV's main office is investigating, then they are really auditing inconsistencies regarding how their own field offices interpreted and applied "full faith and credit" to register out of state cars with a smog exemption.

Thanks for posting and your efforts to keep the CC community up to date.

[Morgester]

Originally Posted by Got the Bug

Mr Morgester,

Which governmental entity is responsible for investigating illegal registrations and forwarding them to your office for prosecution? If the DMV's main office is investigating, then they are really auditing inconsistencies regarding how their own field offices interpreted and applied "full faith and credit" to register out of state cars with a smog exemption.

Thanks for posting and your efforts to keep the CC community up to date.

We are aware of inconsistencies within DMV field offices and are striving to put forward consistent, understandable, and workable rules.

I am unaware of any arrest or prosecution for registration fraud where the linage of a vehicle is disclosed and DMV choose to register the vehicle in a certain manner. The key for the consumer has always been disclosure. Once you tell DMV what it really is then it is DMV’s issue.

Where you get in trouble is where you know the vehicle was not built in 1965 but you write that down anyway and we all know there is only one reason to do that – getting around emission testing.

[vanoochka]

Originally Posted by Morgester

Where you get in trouble is where you know the vehicle was not built in 1965 but you write that down anyway and we all know there is only one reason to do that – getting around emission testing.

Mr. Morgester,

I'm going through the SB100 process, so this is just an FYI.

I purchased my car from an Arizona dealer, with no idea that there was even such as thing as the SB100. The car was titled in Arizona as a "1965 Ford Cobra". When I went to register it at the CA DMV, I told the clerk who took my tax payment that the car was actually a 1999 Superformance, not a Ford. She specifically told me they would use the model and year designation from the Arizona title. So, she wrote my California title as a "1965 Ford Cobra".

When I went to the visual inspection station during this same visit, there was a lot of confusion because the car has two VINs: one original VIN plate from the SPF dealer, and one Arizona VIN plate. My first set of paperwork from the above-mentioned clerk was written with the original VIN. However, a supervisor finally got involved during the visual inspection and decided to use the Arizona VIN. They then redid the paperwork, changing the VINs.

It was only months later that I found this website and learned about SB100. As mentioned above, I've decided to go through the process this year and only post the above to give you an accurate view into what is going on at the CA DMV field offices.

I knew the car wasn't a 1965 Ford Cobra, and they knew the car wasn't a 1965 Ford Cobra, but I have a California titled "1965 Ford Cobra".