The truck's CEL came on a few weeks ago, so I stopped into the dealership on the way home. They are usually very helpful, but there is a new service monkey there, and he wanted $90 for a "vehicle inspection".
Now I don't mind $90 per hour for a qualified mechanic, but $90 for a 5 minute code read is not going to happen. I left the dealership, and put my $90 to better use.

I now have a OBD reader that works great with either my PalmPilot or my laptop. Spent the whole weekend taking readings and watching the fuel maps. The CEL turned out to be the infamous "minor evap leak", also know as the loose gas cap error.

Big thanks to John for his Palm OBD codes database.

As usual, all the details or on my site. If you have any questions, just let me know.

http://silvertank.batcave.net/obd.html

 

Thats awsome...wish i had one...where did you get it?

 

http://www.obdallinone.com/

 

I had the same problem, but it was fixed under extended warrenty along with a few other things.

 

i was gunna say, or you could jsut go to autozone for free... but that seems liek a sweet thing, i like how you can see all the data and such... goood find...

 

Many autozones charge these days, or have discontinued the service.

Your welcome, George. I found some holes in that database and I haven't updated it, but it's still useful. I bought a new commercial unit that also has CAN network capability in it and I keep it in the truck.

My old Palm programs though allow looking at some data items (one of the programs is not mine) and that's nice when you want to see data but don't want to bother with the laptop.

Are you just using my database for lookup, or does my program talk to your reader?

 

Just for lookups now, since I haven't tried the reader portion yet. I need another CEL to see if the reader works, and I'm hoping not too see one for a long while.

The best part so far has been the wealth of info that you get from all the sensors. There is truely an amazing amount of data processed by the ECU. I would love to have an in-car computer and monitor that continuosly.

One thing I did find interesting is that the 2.3 dohc's run hot. The water temp off the OBD sensor pegs the gauge on all my OBD software. I could reset it if I knew the correct temps for my engine. I asked the service managers at Ford, but their numbers were too low. My manual and Ford factory CD also has no info. Apparently an all aluminum engine tends to boil it's water.