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90 quid to get my Citroen Dispatch engine diagnostics looked at. WHAT ON EARTH!?!? Has the world gone nuts?? Does anyone have any idea where this can be done cheaper? I'm in Edinburgh.
£80 was the rate for Ford to do the same a few years back. So, sadly, I'm not surprisued
The RAC did it for free when I broke down...
if you can get hold of an obd2 fault reader id happily tell you what the fault codes mean .. but id guess that im not being much help really !
I'm not surprised. I bet the diagnostics machines costs thousands from Citroen.
I read somewhere recently that if you hold down the odometer reset and switch the ifnition on and off it will display the codes, and then you just google them.
Some ATS around here are doing £29.99 offer prices.
Give your local ATS a ring and ask.
Get one of [url= http://www.dealextreme.com/p/elm327-bluetooth-obd-ii-wireless-transceiver-dongle-16921 ]these[/url] (or similar) and do it yourself on your phone...
What Frogstomp said. I got a bluetooth reader off ebay for about £20 and if you have a smart phone get an app (think it is called torque). The app picks up the code from the reader and then links through to a web page detailing the diagnosis. Saved me a load of money sorting an EGR valve issue I had that kept setting off the engine warning light.
Does that work for vag cars as well?
AA checked mine- even cleared them and got me to drive around til it broke again. Local ford dealership had offered to do it for "Between £70 and £140 depending on how long it takes".
It takes 30 seconds.
As mentioned above, I use the Torque app for £2.95 on my android phone (which is a brilliant app), and a bluetooth reader from ebay which cost £15.
Ask on here, these guys know pretty much all there is to know about Citroens. Norrie (Noz) has some Citroen Diagnostic kit. He's out near Linlithgow/Falkirk.
[quote=transapp]Does that work for vag cars as well?
Yes, it should work with all cars that have an industry-standard OBD2 interface...
Thanks guys. Loads of help for me there.
last time I had a Citroen [loan car from work] the diagnostics at the main dealer meant plugging it into a IDSN line and someone at the factory in Paris looking at it
I'm in Edinburgh. If you're not desperate, I've got an engine diagnostics reader/code resetter OBD2 thingy. Not home until next Thursday, but you're welcome to come over and have a tinker.
Hi, I've a reader that will do the job for you and I'm in Edinburgh
Crikey! £90! They think money grow on tree? Greedy bugger.
Reading the code is the easy bit, anyone can do that with the right equiptment, but correctly diagnosing the fault can be time consuming.
Yup, and there's no guarantee the the Citroen garage will have the first idea how to diagnose.
It was a similar situation that ended up with me getting the OBD2 reader. Engine light on the wife's Ka, trip to Ford, £75 to read the codes, "diagnosis" went as follows:
No we can't show you the fault code sheet, you'll have to pay extra.
We recommend changing the the coil pack, the HT leads and the spark plugs - in that order - to see if it clears the fault. If not, we don't know.
I went and bought a reader, got the fault code, Googled it, turned out to be an O2 sensor fault, replaced it and the light went off and the car was back to normal.
Aye, diagnosis is the skilled part. That was another highlight of talking to my dealership- they got details of the fault from me, and said that the fault code reading would be an unneccesary expense, it was definately the cam position sensor- not worth even looking at anything else, they'd seen it loads of times, known fault.
This is the sort of thing that's supposed to make main dealer prices worth paying- model expertise. But considering that this engine doesn't actually [i]have[/i] a cam sensor...
My Skoda was in being diagnosed 😀 for 4 days once. It's not simply a case of plug in and see what it says.
Apparently, after failure of my throttle sensor in Scotland, the Carlisle Skoda dealer I was recovered to replaced the sensor but also upgraded the cars software.
As a result of the upgrade the exhaust temperature sensor on the DPF didn't think much of the upgrade and a few weeks later started throwing in odd temperature readings to the car making the engine light come on.
eventually the technician in the Skoda dealer in Manchester ( near where the car broke down) gave up and got a technician from the Czech Republic to have a look overa LAN connection. I think they reinstalled the original software!
While the car was in the Manchester Skoda dealers I visited it twice, to get stuff out of the boot etc, and had the crack with the technician. They were properly perplexed.
These things sent always as simple as one imagines as cars these days are pretty complex things.
Glad it was under warranty. 4 days on the diagnostic machine, with a technician, and a hire car for me!