Shop Shots Volume 43 Insider Pictures of Automotive Service
Happy New Year everyone! I hope that you all had a great holiday, and New Year’s Eve. We did our standard NYE. It consisted of my wife Jenn being sick, and me just hanging out at home. I actually enjoyed it. Let’s get in to those pictures!
This goes in the “What the heck where they thinking” category. What you are looking at is the exhaust of a 2003 Passat wagon. Someone wanted to change the end pipes and tips. To be fair to the customer, they may have bought it like that. The pipes and tips are riveted on. This is a very poor way to try to attach an exhaust. The little round spots on the exhaust are the rivets, somewhere around 15 of them. Someone took a lot of time to do such a poor job. Please don’t try this at home.
This is a rare look inside a tire. You are looking at a tire that had a screw in it, and was repaired. I find it odd that part of the screw is still there. That glob of orange and black goo is from the plug. Someone attempted to repair the tire by plugging it. My guess is they plugged it twice, but I am not sure. A tire plug is a good temporary repair, but having it patched or plug/patched is the best way. I wonder if this is the reason they had to replace a tire. 🙂
This is a first for me. You are looking at the overhead light on a Jetta. The customer was complaining that there was bugs in the light. Well, sure enough there are the bugs in the light. I have never seen that happen in a VW before. Maybe she left her sunroof open? The only way they could get in there is through the top.
This is a picture of a VW scan tool screen. Our scan tools are pretty good, but not even close to perfect. Sometimes a weird code will come up, or a screen that does not make sense. This is a classic example.
Control Module, watchdog timer faulty.
HAHA, what the heck does that mean? Most, if not all, modules have some type of timer in them. Maybe this one was having an issue? Usually faults like this cause no issues, and have no symptoms. I just have to laugh every time I see something like this.
Well, that does it for another volume of Shop Shots. Be sure to tune in next week for more behind the scenes pictures from a VW service department. I also want to just take one minute to thank you all for such an awesome 2012. This community has grown so much over the last year. I can’t thank you all enough for hanging with me. All of your comments, likes, and shares are excellent. Please keep it up. Let’s make 2013 even more better 😉
One last thing. As many of you know we are in the process of moving. It has been a huge pain in the butt. I think it will all work out really great, but the stress level in my house has been sky high. But, right now our current house is mostly packed, and that is a big relief. I will keep you all as up to date as I can with the progress. We, Jenn and I, will be starting a new site about it in a few weeks. The site is up, but I am still in the building stages. Once that is live, I will share it with you guys. It will be about home DIY, gardening, and other cool home related stuff.
I like the exhaust. That looks so much easier than using clamps…
For the timer, in computer land, my understanding of a watchdog timer, is something that waits for a reply or status update, and if it doesn’t get one to reset something. Sounds like one part of the computer system is having issues with another.
With everything going on in a modern car, and the harsh environment that a car is, some times it is amazing they even work.
However, looks like the error messages could be more helpful, but where is the fun in that.
I really can’t see how someone thought spending the time to rivet the exhaust a million times would be better or easier than a 3 dollar clamp lol.
What probably happened with the screw portion in the plug is when he/she stuck the rasp thru the hole to ream it out a portion of the screw was still in the hole and it pushed in then got caught in the goop later, only thing I can think of anyway.
Good luck with the move! For me the worst is unpacking it all!
A decent explanation of what a Watchdog Timer does can be found here:
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Watchdog_timer
It doesn’t surprise me to find a watchdog timer in a control module, but what I can’t tell you is how the control module goes about determining that said watchdog timer is faulty. 😉
What module/car was this in?
I am looking forward to your new site
I like the post and your blog too. Thanks for sharing this here with us. Your blog is really very good and helpful one too.
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