VBA Internet Explorer dropdown list trouble - vba

Question

I'm trying to scrape some data using VBA via Excel. I'm pretty rusty with VBA but I'm confident in my google-fu, 5+ hours in and no luck yet. I have seen many ways to work with drop-down menus but none seem to work with this one. I have successfully navigated to https://www.kbb.com/used-cars/ but I cannot work with the "year" drop-down. Maybe I am not using the correct id/name? Any advice is appreciated, let me know if I left any important info out.
Code:
Sub WebForumEntry()
Dim IE As Object
Set IE = CreateObject("InternetExplorer.Application")
IE.Top = 0
IE.Left = 0
IE.Width = 800
IE.Height = 600
IE.AddressBar = 0
IE.StatusBar = 0
IE.Toolbar = 0
IE.Navigate "http://www.kbb.com"
IE.Visible = True
Do
DoEvents
Loop Until IE.ReadyState = 4
'Click on the "Used Car Values" link
Set AllHyperlinks = IE.document.getelementsbytagname("A")
For Each hyper_link In AllHyperlinks
If hyper_link.innertext = "Used Car Prices" Then
hyper_link.Click
Exit For
End If
Next
'Select model year"
Set e = IE.document.getElementbyid("yearDropdown")
Dim o
For Each o In e.Options
If o.Value = "2012" Then
o.Selected = True
Exit For
End If
Next
End Sub

Answer 1

In the HTML there are no Option tags for you to select:
<div class="form-group">
<select id="yearDropdown" name="yearId" class="dropdown-one year-dropdown" data-default-option="Year" data-preselected-value=""></select>
</div>
The years are generated dynamically depending on whether you choose new/ used etc. So you can't select something that doesn't exist - perhaps you can directly set the value e.g.:
IE.document.getElementbyid("yearDropdown").value = "2012"
Edit
Note there is an issue in your original code:
'Click on the "Used Car Values" link
Set AllHyperlinks = IE.document.getelementsbytagname("A")
For Each hyper_link In AllHyperlinks
If hyper_link.innertext = "Used Car Prices" Then
hyper_link.Click
Exit For
End If
Next
'Select model year"
Set e = IE.document.getElementbyid("yearDropdown") '<-- error here if page not loaded per hyper_link.Click
When you call hyper_link.Click it will load another page (where the dropdowns are) and then per the Exit For the next command to run is Set e = IE... which will try and access an element that doesn't exist yet because the page is still loading per the hyper_link.Click. To work-around this you can just put in a pause like below:
Application.Wait Now + TimeValue("0:00:04")
It's a bit of a hack - and there may be better ways to solve it - but it will allow you to set the dropdown per my first suggestion :
Full code (re-write of yours):
Option Explicit
Sub WebForumEntry()
Dim IE As Object
Dim AllHyperLinks As Object
Dim hyper_link As Object
Dim e As Object
Set IE = CreateObject("InternetExplorer.Application")
IE.Top = 0
IE.Left = 0
IE.Width = 800
IE.Height = 600
IE.AddressBar = 0
IE.StatusBar = 0
IE.Toolbar = 0
IE.Navigate "http://www.kbb.com"
IE.Visible = True
' wait for page to load
Do
DoEvents
Loop Until IE.ReadyState = 4
'Click on the "Used Car Values" link
Set AllHyperLinks = IE.document.getelementsbytagname("A")
For Each hyper_link In AllHyperLinks
If hyper_link.innertext = "Used Car Prices" Then
hyper_link.Click
Exit For
End If
Next
'wait 4 seconds - so page fully loads
Application.Wait Now + TimeValue("0:00:04")
'Select model year"
Set e = IE.document.getElementbyid("yearDropdown")
' set a year
e.Value = "2016"
End Sub

Answer 2

...try and access an element that doesn't exist yet because the page is still loading...just put in a pause
Fantastic, thank you Robin!