First off- if this is some type of violation please remove the thread.

I truly appreciate the relative simplicity of our vintage engines and truck/cars in general.
That's why I drive my 1975 F250 Highboy!!

The reality is that I also have "modern era" vehicles that require maintenance and diagnostics.
I've grown tired of having subpar OBDII diagnostic tools to simply read and remove DTC codes.
Probably have collected three or four various $35 to $70 simple OBDII code readers over the past 10 years- each one was "good enough" at the time.

Looking for advise/recommendation on a REASONABLY priced($400+/-) bi-directional scanner tool that someone has real life experience with.
It will be a steep learning curve for me for sure- but my hope and desire is to obtain a tool that has decent peer usage and online support/tutorials.

Can't even do a simple brake job on most post 2015 cars that have electronic parking brakes anymore....( I know you can mechanically and/or electrically wind back the EPB motor- just rather not keep doing it caveman style)

Thanks in advance.
Tbruz

 

The next level scanner is going to be one that reads abs, transmission, body electrical, srs (seatbelt), and camera/auto drive/brake DTC's

I'm not sure if snapon had one that advanced yet and if so I can't even imagine what the cost of it may be.

It has been 10 years since I was a technician at Honda and at that time the lane departure and blind spot indicator sensor/feature was just coming out. Only the Honda HDS tool could read those DTC's but that was 10 years ago.

You can get a srs/abs function tool st harbor freight that is very simple and easy to use. It will even read fuel pressure, intake air temp and a whole list 50 or more sensors. Even watch O2 sensors and see if one is not sending the same voltage as the others in a multi system. Misfire monitor etc. Even my 14 yr old harbor freight scanner does most of that stuff.

With all that being said none of them not even the Honda HDS is going to tell you what's wrong with the vehicle. Or what part has failed.

For instance if you show a evap emissions code a better scanner is not going to tell you that there is a problem with the charcoal canister leaking or a hose leaking. With the DTC you have to then follow the diagnostic steps from the beginning and work your way thru it.

Now remember this is my experience from 10 years ago. And on that note my.wifes 2017 wrangler developed a misfire a few months ago and the little cheap scanner I bought few years ago at auto parts store gave me a code said something along the line of "injector circuit failure" leading me right to the part that had failed. Now I guess that could be a broken wire too. But at least I knew I wasn't going to have to swap coils and reassemble to isolate the issue.

My suggestion is go to harbor freight and get one that does
Engine DTC
transmission DTC
SRS (seatbelt airbag and crash/impact sensors
Basically the more you spend on it the more it's going to do.
northern tool has some also.

Anything comparable at 300-400 from harbor freight you can add 4-5 times as much from one of the big tool trucks. I'm not knocking them but unless you make you living with it it's not worth the investment.

 

Thanks 77HOS- not looking for the high $$ big tool truck pro models.
I just know that bi-directional capability is required to "activate" the sensors and pumps and what all that are suspect.
Ill take a peek at what HF has to offer.
Tbruz