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Right bit of back ground I work In the technical support department for a vehicle manufacturer within the uk and after some rather crazy days and stories of dealers not having tools I thought I’d ask the question of what sort of diagnostic equipment the average Main/franchised dealer would have over in the states ( Company I work for has many vehicles in the states as well)
Some of the things over the last few weeks dealers haven’t had include
Any kind of oscilloscope which seems to be very common especially in smaller dealerships
A smoke machine again very common not to have one
Cylinder leakage tester
compression tester
A flat edge to measure the cylinder/block warpage
A back pin set + a D.m.m ( Dealer wanted help chasing an electrical fault 😆 )
Now this is maybe 2-3 weeks worth of excuses and I cant see any reason why any large dealership wouldn’t have these other than the fact that the management of dealerships are greedy and expect the techs to fix things using magic and pixy dust.
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If they do have one; no one knows where it is.
It’s in some guys box, stolen, put on a shelf and forgotten, or broke.These are all tools I wouldn’t expect my place of employment to supply anyways.
Evap machine… Im building one myself from a fog machine and baby oil
fuel pressure gauge and flow rate gauge
O-scope very helpful
and bi-directional scan tool
now some of the scanner can have external o-scopes in them
now really coman is a tire leak tank, easyer then using soap water all over the tire just dump the tire in the tank ans check for leaks
ac gadges
leak detectors
aliment tools(can be used to do diags)
gas exshost analizers” flat edge to measure the cylinder/block warpage”
most shops around me once they take off the head they send it to a machine shop… because you have to check heads doe cracks both visable and no visable and valve gaps… machine shops have the tools to do that… not even dealers have them… everyone out sources it… so if you reinstall the head and thinks it fine and you have a leak you will have to redo it all over again for free and take the money out of your pocket this time to repair/ replace the headthats why ppl take it to machine shps they have leak tanks for heads and blocks and gauges for mesureing warpage a hell of a lot better then a flat edge can ever do
[quote=”Fmxvxx” post=172529]A smoke machine again very common not to have one[/quote]
personally I havent see any shops that dont have one… if they dont have a pro one they make a basic one, but most of the time they have a pro one
In the US:
For 20 techs
Most places have 1-2 Laptops with manufacturer software. If independent it will likely be a Snap-On Verus or the like.
You will have 1-2 smoke machines.
1-2 A/C Machines
DMM
Battery Charger / Tester (Normally not load pile)Most places do not have o-scopes if they are a dealer. Independents only have them if they have expensive Snap-On tools. Compression/Leak down testers would be owned by techs not a shop so hit or miss. No place has had a proper straight edge (people use rulers, yard sticks, or levels which is hilariously bad. Here you normally just send it to a machine shop to have them look at anything like that. Most places will have a lead set for pins but, rarely a backprobing kit unless required by the manufacturer.
Btw, i have worked at 2 dealerships and pepboys both dealerships were large. I personally own an O-scope have a pair of cheap back probes I made that work in 99% of applications cost me a wopping $10 USD. Compression/Leak detectors are mechanics owned I own an auto one but, not diesel and most big rig dealerships do not own one. A good diesel one is $5k for all the proper attachments and is really easy to break the parts on. Hell coolant pressure testers are hit and miss.
If it is a major dealership I would tell them to suck it up butter cup and buy proper diagnostic tools. My guess though is they have these things just the techs are lying to you because they know what the issue is because they caused it or they think they know exactly what it is (likely wrong in this case) so they are trying to get you to tell them what they want to hear. Also in the US techs are made to supply a large amount of the diagnostic equipment (Should be illegal if you ask me) but, they could be modeling the buisness’ off of that. I would make sure you get the actual tech on the phone and level with him about it. If you can shut off recordings if you even have them you can tell him that to make him feel more at ease.
I’m an independent garage technician and I own every single one of those except the smoke machine,That one is supplied by shop owner. When I worked at the dealership again smoke machine provided by dealership. The rest of those tools would be considered technician level items.. I honestly cant see how you can fix cars without some of those tools(Just guessing I guess). With the technology of cars today and some of the intermittent electrical problems you run into I personally think any good drivability technician worth his salt should have an oscope.
In all honesty I haven’t used an o-scope since I left school. Honestly you really do not need one if you know what you are doing and have access to dealer level information. Update all modules. Hook up the scan tool monitor the voltage and PID of what is malfunctioning go for a drive. Go to your test drive roads. IE pot holes the size of texas, speed bumps, s curves, inside and outside banked curves, etc. Then do voltage drops on wires, inspect pins/connectors for fit, corrosion, etc. If it passes voltage drop and inspection great it is sensor, actuator, etc and replace and test drive. If it doesn’t fix it replace module.
In all honesty you should be able to listen to injectors and know they are going bad verify with noid light not wiring and done. Low amp probe and dmm for alternators. Unplug fuses/connectors for modules puking on the can network.
Explain to me in what circumstance an o-scope is actually required?
I had to break out the scope a Couple of weeks ago. I was working on getting a 79 CJ5 to pass emissions.
What was going on gmule that forced you to use a scope? Not doubting you just wondering? Cause I have yet to run into a time I have needed it but, i did buy it so i would like to have an excuse 😛 Been a tech for 5 yrs and i get a lot of the really screwy stuff which is why i bought it and the fact that me and a friend/co-worker are thinking of trying to do a scanner danner type of channel with big rigs. Still in this would be a cool idea stage.
Showing my age here but this is how we found the ignition problems back in the day. I was getting a 79 CJ5 to pass emissions it had high CO and HC so first things first what’s the ignition system up to. No black box to tell me what cylinder or cylinders were not happy
Nice. Im guessing there is no emissions exemptions for age where you are at. That looks like an injector on the scope. Couldn’t just pull one at a time and check the emissions each time? Did ya listen to them with a stethoscope?
Or did you avoid having to pull stuff apart by just hooking to it with the scope cause that old I can tell you I would definitely do that to avoid disconnecting things.
No injectors on this old pig. carburetor and your basic primitive ignition box with vacuum advance.
i was testing the coil and plugs to see which cylinders were not firing correctly. that is after I found 1 bad wire and two bad plugs giving it random miss fires on 3 cylinders. I changed all the plugs wires cap and rotor but it was nice to be able to verify that was fixed using the scope as a before and after snap shot.I also broke out the 5 gas analyzer to verify that I had corrected the hi CO and HC condition.
And to answer your other comment up to 1982 gets the idle and 2500 rpm E test everything else gets the enhanced IM240 dyno test and now on newer cars they just check to see if all of the monitors have ran and no obdII faults. .
Ahh i was wondering why there would be injectors on something so old. Makes sense as both are coils collapsing as to why they would look the same.
Im so glad my vw tdi is emissions exempt.
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