Anyone else in California with this car having trouble passing a smog check? I was told that my catalytic converter has to be replaced; in addition, the exhaust manifold is cracked. The dealership says the catalytic is on backorder for this car and costs about $3k (worth more than the car). If you are have or are experiencing this problem, what have you done?
the smog referee is suggesting that I retire the car. My car is in good working condition, only problem is that it won’t pass smog because CA’s emission laws or so strict

 

It's possible that they're all on the level, and knowledgeable about your car.

Or they're all full of beans (that's the G-rated version).

With a cracked manifold, you're going to be getting all sorts of odd readings from your O2 sensors, and that's going to affect the operation of your catalytic converter, and the pre- and post-cat sensor's ability to report on your car's emissions.

If it was me, I'd swap out the manifold (hopefully it's a non-turbo since that will make it a whole lot easier), then I'd clear the codes and drive it for a week or two to see if it reset all the readiness indicators.

You can buy new cats from (for example) rockauto.com for around $200, though all of 'em say they're not for sale in California (where apparently it's more environmentally sensible to build mountains of new cars rather than to allow a few random carbon toots to escape the tailpipe of your old car). That said, I'd consider just having an independent mechanic swap out the manifold-through-cat part of your exhaust system, using a boneyard part. It'll cost a small fraction of the gouging Volvo wants to inflict on you, and will most likely last as long as your car does.

 

Unfortunately, emission laws are much stricter in California, than they are in other states. Our mechanic welded the crack on the manifold and all seems to be ok. When he ran the smog check, the codes for the cat came back bad still.
The car is in very good condition, but the cat is the problem, sadly. Any thing else you can recommend that maybe our mechanic hasn't thought of? Would hate to retire a perfectly working car.

 

You may get off easy yet... The crack in the manifold would have been messing with the engine management computer, probably causing it to inject more fuel than necessary / appropriate. This kind of thing tends to cause build-up on the cat's internal structures, and can affect the way it works. There are some "cat cleaners" out there that may work, and sometimes just driving the car with your right foot planted in the carpet will help restore the cat's performance (by drastically increasing the internal temperature in the cat, burning off the build-up).

If that doesn't work, if it was my car, I'd just swap out the cat with a factory "Kalifornia-kompliant" cat. Or I'd move to a different state. ;-)

 

https://www.summitracing.com/parts/b...olvo/model/v50 doesn't say that it isn't ca compliant and what town are you smogging in

 

https://www.autoanything.com/emissio...tic-converters but select the ca option and its 140 and also replace the manifold with a used one and see if it was still the cat but I know how strict ca can be I reffed my 88 4runner after swapping in a 4.3 chevy v6