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Automakers to Make Diagnostic Codes Available
Rubbersoul writes "As reported on /. a few months ago independent auto repair shops are a bit tense about not having access to car computer diagnostic codes. Well it seems that now the auto makers will share these codes after all. According to an article at CNN the codes will be available to all professional mechanics as well as amateurs working out of their garage at home. Good to see the auto makers came around on this one, even if it did take Congress to help a bit."
There has been a recent trend in mom'n'pop (well just pop usually) mechanic stores fading away because of big companies sucking up all the businness. Ever seen those commercials that compare Joe Blow mechanic to a big time Jiffy Lube or NTB buff? Notice how the mechanic is portrayed as a greasy hungover hobo, and the friendly neighborhood WalMart-of-cars mechanic is clean cut, muscular, educated, and reviewing what appears to be a concise list of repairs with the client. I'm not against corporations coming to town on a political level, but it stinks to drive out in the country and seeing mom'n'pop stores taken over. And with all of the computer chips and advanced parts requiring really expensive tools to fix, it's nice to see something to go against that trend and empower the small guys again ;)
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Now i can make my engine rev to the beat of my music. No need to pump the breaks!
Yes, it is news. No, auto makers such as BMW and Volkswagen were not releasing the diagnostic codes. This made it impossible for non-dealer repair shops to diagnose a variety of problems on newer model cars.
My father is the supervisor of the auto shop at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, and he was very concerned about this, as they certainly don't want to have to outsource any repairs on their fleet. These days, much of the work in diagnosing car problems involves hooking up a computer to the car and asking the car's computer, "OK, what's not normal?". It's not quite that simple; you still have to know what you're doing in order to figure out what's wrong (not like a dialog box pops up and says, "Mass air flow sensor bad. Replace? Y/N).
Anyway, I spoke to my father today to make sure he had seen this article, and he said that basically the auto makers have said, "We promise to release the specs if you don't pass a law saying we have to do so." He doesn't really trust them, but is hopeful, and will wait and see.
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Imagine: you're doing the monthly check, and discover that your mileage has suddenly dropped 10%. Even before something goes wrong, you could take it to a garage and give them strong diagnostic data.
When the time comes to sell the car, you can provide a day-to-day profile of the car's history: every oil change, fillup, and repair automatically logged. Real examples of winter vs summer and city vs. highway performance.
Seems to me that the technology is already available, and some of the functions are already in place. All that really needs to be done is for someone to hack together an interface. Any takers?
Interociter
-=What do I want? I'm an American. I want more.
We're actually working on something like this already. We'll see if we can't integrate this into the dashpc project. We're working with the guys at freediag and hopefully they'll be able to help us integrate the ODBII codes into the dashpc codebase.
We'll probably end up recording all the codes into a public mysql db that can be queried or integrated into the core code.
This would allow the UI to display the EXACT problem ("Your 3rd spark plug from the left is firing oddly - please check") instead of just "check engine". Very good news indeed.
Don't think that a small group of dedicated individuals can't change the world. It's the only thing that ever has.