Las Vegas - The OE Tool Forum, held with the Congress of Automotive Repair and Service (CARS) on Oct. 31 in Las Vegas and hosted by the Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) and the Automotive Service Association (ASA), signals a growing trend in aftermarket repairs.
Forum panelists included the BMW Group's Douglas McGregor, senior emissions engineer, and Jason W. Kozak, aftersales compliance engineer; John H. Rugge Jr., emissions activities manager for Fuji Heavy Industries USA Inc. (Subaru); and Mark Saxonberg, manager of Service Technology for Toyota Motor Sales USA Inc.
"When I started working on cars, they were just beginning to be equipped with electronic fuel injection," said Howard Pitkow, panel chair and ASA Mechanical Division Operations Committee member, in his opening comments. "There wasn't such a thing as a scan tool, so we used test lights."
Pitkow's remarks provided a historical perspective for the more complex issues addressed by panelists at the forum.
Access to OE information and training, the cost of OE service capability, and compatibility with the Society of Automotive Engineers (SAE) J2534 specification for aftermarket reprogramming tools are issues that will profoundly affect aftermarket repair shop operations in the near future, the panelists agreed.
To put those issues in a more concrete context, the J2534 requirement currently covers emissions-related reprogramming but may not include programming of body control components. Modern vehicles, however, are using an increasing number of on-board computers or "nodes" to manage body control, vehicle security, and vehicle safety functions. In some cases, the node might be incorporated with a component part, such as a radio or wiper assembly.
The aftermarket repair process will be drastically affected because, in many cases, OE scan tools must be used to access and download the various component calibrations from the manufacturer's Web site.
Jason Kozak opened the forum by describing the plans BMW has under way to diagnose its sophisticated vehicle networking systems. In essence, the BMW technician will use a laptop computer to access a domestic database for routine repair and service information. For diagnostic issues, the technician will transmit diagnostic data to a BMW database in Germany. The technician will then receive procedural guidance to resolve the problem.
"Because BMW needed to have an automated diagnostics system that will make its technicians more time-effective, it has replaced the traditional diagnostic tree with a computerized data processing system," McGregor said. BMW's new "3-G" information system, not yet in service, will retail in the $30,000 to $40,000 range.
John Rugge Jr. said Subaru has produced two new scan tools, the Hitachi Diagnostic System 3000 (HDS 3000) and the Subaru Select Monitor III (SSM III). "Although the HDS is designed for the North American aftermarket, it is not a watered-down version of the dealership's SSMIII tool. Both tools are identical in capacity and appearance," he said.
Blue Streak Electronics (BSE) will provide the tech support for the HDS. "The HDS scan tool will retail for about $2,000. When packaged with reprogramming software and four quarterly updates, the HDS scan tool kit will retail for about $3,100," Rugge said.
Mark Saxonberg introduced Toyota's new Techstream Information System (TIS), which was recently made available to the aftermarket for $7,995. "The technology curve is now on a vertical climb," he said.
In response to more complex vehicle technology, the TIS is designed as a mobile PC-based system using a Panasonic Tough Book to provide full access to all current Toyota technical and reprogramming information.
"Toyota is focusing on providing positive ownership experiences for is customers," Saxonberg said. "Part of that effort is providing OE-level service capability to independent shops servicing Toyota vehicles. The time will come when the right tools and information will be required to fix anything on a modern vehicle."