Car diagnostic computer scanners

[ska invita]

Does anyone on here own one?
Mechanic I was speaking to said the ones garages have cost £££s and do good stuff (reset error codes), consumer ones are crap

Any insights/opinions?

 

[existentialist]

I use a Bluetooth scanner which talks to an app called Torque on my phone. It's got me out of a few spots of bother, not to mention a few others (with consequent bragging rights)

 

[ska invita]

I use a Bluetooth scanner which talks to an app called Torque on my phone. It's got me out of a few spots of bother, not to mention a few others (with consequent bragging rights)

What do you scan with the scanner?

 

[existentialist]

What do you scan with the scanner?

You are reading ECU fault codes, and realtime status variables

 

[ska invita]

You are reading ECU fault codes, and realtime status variables

Can you provide a link of some description please as I can't picture it

 

[existentialist]

Can you provide a link of some description please as I can't picture it

Torque Wiki

wiki.torque-bhp.com

 

[ska invita]

Torque Wiki

wiki.torque-bhp.com

This looks great, thank you
in this video the guy paid £15 for the adaptor and £5 for the app
Video didnt go into error codes but it looks overly thorough

 

[DownwardDog]

They are not all created equal and it really depends what you are trying to do with it. If your car is pre-1996 then very few scanners will work. Only a Bosch scanner will successfully scan my 1995 348GTS.

If you're into resetting codes, rewriting values, data logging and accessing the car's hidden features you want something like a Topdon ArtiDiag. I have the Topdon Phoenix which is brilliant but expensive. It lets you see all the faults on the same screen super-imposed over a schematic which makes finding wiring faults a doddle. I don't think my 2011 R35 would have ever run again if I didn't have this.

BlueDriver Pro is good if you just want to read codes. I don't think it does all 10 ODB2 modes so it check it works on your car.

 

[mauvais]

I bought an iCarsoft thing a while back, a model for French & Italian cars. It could read more than the generic OBD dongle & Torque. Specifically it could read and reset ABS, and it's how I figured out that my problem was an ABS sensor. As it turned out, a good middle ground between the generic, and clones of the OEM software.