20 Sep
2011
20 Sep
'11
1:16 p.m.
The car manufacturers certainly do their best to
prevent their
customers
from servicing their cars. Somebody I know had a Volvo V70 that just
Indeed. I feel that cars are often designed to make jobs difficult, or
require sepcial tools. Heck, my father's Skoda needs a special tool to
remove the spark plugs (!), fortunately the dealer sold us one.
refused to start one morning. Nothing obviously
wrong, it just would
not
start. It had to be towed to a Volvo dealer. IIRC the problem turned
out
to be that two of the car's computers decided they didn't want to talk
to
each other. A software upgrade fixed the problem. It may even have been
the case that none of the computers had to do with engine management.
I am pretty sure taht on said Skoda (and I assume other VAG vehicles),
the engine management controller talks to a controller in the instruemnt
cluster to verify that the ignition key has returned the right code. And
that you have to reprogram various codes if you replace either unit, or
the engine won't start. BLETCH!
Because they want you to either buy a new unit, or
send the unit to one
Alas I think you're right. Of course it doesn't work with me,, at least
not for my own stuff. I choose things I can repair, and if the
manufactuers won't supply a service manual I produce my own, if they
don't sell spares, I make them. It limits me to older technology, of
course, but it doesn't half reduce my stress level.
of their own facilities to be repaired? In case of
car manufacturers I
believe a significant portion of their profits comes from spare parts
and
service.
Do you have a mobile phone? Modern ones seem to be designed to break
down
slowly after about 18 months, they are full of custom parts, and the
people who repair them do their best to drive you mad. My work phone is
(hopefully) being repaired right now. It is 17 months old, the display
went permanently blank around August 6th, and the repair people have
most
likely not started working on it yet. I shall probably have to wait
another
2 weeks for it.
I do have cellualr phone, it's one a friend gave me when he upgraded.
It's just a simple phone, nothing more. I use it very rarely, and could
easily manage without it.
I don;t fancy tryign to repair it. It's all SMD (and most BGa at that)
inside, I don't think I recognised any of the ICs :-(
-tony