OBD II reader and Forscan program.

[Bushbasher]

A couple of weeks ago I invested a whopping $9.89, including postage, for one of those chinese OBD2 diagnostic scan tools and then downloaded the latest Forscan program to my laptop. When it arrived I went out to the Sportsman and plugged it in. Within seconds it connected to the car and asked me if it was LTD/Fairlane/Fairmont or Forte/Futura/XR! So it recognised the odd hybrid AU setup immediately and started scanning. It pulled up half a dozen old codes straight away and let me clear them then scanned again automatically and pulled up a current code that told me my VCT solenoid was playing up which I duly changed and now I've picked up about 50-60km to the tank.

That little $10 investment saved me a bucket load of cash chasing my fuel economy problem and the beauty of the Forscan program is that it not only pulls the codes and allows you to clear them but the codes it pulls, it tells you what they are and there's a troubleshooting guide to help you track down the problem, AND IT'S FREE!! What an excellent bit of kit.
It also does real time logging and other stuff but I haven't played with that yet but even without any of that it's an absolute must have in your AU tool kit as far as I'm concerned, I love it.

Just thought I'd share.

Bushbasher