Need help

I am new to this forum and just bought recently a used 2006 tacoma from a person with 118k miles. Recently I took it to get inspected and it failed the inspection. They told me it was the catalytic converters but i am being told that for that to be a problem the engine light should be on. The truck does need a oil change not severely but it does need it. I was told the previous owner could have disabled the engine light to sell it Quick. Also could it just be a bad sensor? Could it be that the need for the oil change is causing problems with the catalytic converters? Any advice on this issue?

 

What exactly did it fail for? You have a picture of report?
Possibly wrong convertors installed for application.
When you turn key to run does Check engine come on?
More info needed
Oil change wouldn't effect smog as that year truck is not tail pipe tested.

 

Welcome to the forum. Go to Autozone and have them pull the codes and let us know what u get

 

They may have just reset the engine light. More info is needed on what it failed for. Could be something simple like an O2 sensor. Usually they are replaced first before a cat.

 

on ALL vehicles when you turn the key to the on position and before you crank the motor there is a self diagnostic that is ran, it is called the "bulb check". All warning lights including the check engine light should illuminate. Some systems like the air bag may go out shortly after this test telling you that that sytem is OK. If the CEL(check engine light) does not illuminate during the bulb check it is an immediate fail. In some states the seller is responsible for the smog.

Yours is a 2006 model so is should be smoged wirelessly meaning that if there are no codes present and the smog monitors* have run and it is ready to be smogged it should have passed. Like stated above, some one might have cleared the existing light in an attempt to defraud you.

*Smog monitors are a series of self tests that have to be completed and passed in order for the vehicle to be ready to be smoged. The most difficult one is the evaporative system. There are no ways to speed up the process, you just have to drive her. The parameters for the evaporative monitor to run are that the fuel tank MUST be between 1/4 and 3/4 full, the intake air temp sensor and the engine coolant temp sensor MUST be within 10 degress of each other and the vehicle MUST have a complete cooling cycle between the 2 trips necessary in order for this test to run. 95% of the time this works, it is that 5% that drives people nuts.

There are inexpensive(< $100) OBDII testers out there... I use BlueDriver and on the roadtest I pull around the corner, plug her in and it connects to my iPhone. WIth it I can check to see if they are trying to pull a fast one, they reset the light and hope it doesnt come back on, and I can see if there are any pending codes... problems waiting to set the CEL... Usually the more you spend $ wise the more features you get. Modern cars can have 50+ modules in them and they all communicate through the OBDII port... I use it as a buying tool AND a selling tool.

 

May very well be just the unknowing owner being taken advantage of .

Not knowing just what state

The invoice should state just what codes were pulled and why it failed .

It may be that the codes were cleared by swapping a battery and all the tests have not run.

We are all just guessing at this point.