The inability to work on your own stuff without a software degree these days is infuriating. I hear you about it sucking the fun out of it.

 

Eh, sometimes it's worth it.

I happily farm out things I'm not interested in doing, that I don't find fun, in return for time spent on projects I enjoy.

Worth it to me to spend my time on my 4runner or C10 and not doing brakes on my Subaru.

 

Eh, sometimes it's worth it.

I happily farm out things I'm not interested in doing, that I don't find fun, in return for time spent on projects I enjoy.

Worth it to me to spend my time on my 4runner or C10 and not doing brakes on my Subaru.

I'll happily do brakes on anything I own, I got quoted $1100 for the rear brakes on my 2019 Duramax when I had it in for an oil change. I need to do those this week actually...

I really just want my YJ back, it's been 3 years. I should have never cut it in half when I have to rely on a friend for the back-half and geometry work. It doesn't help I have to cut off everything we did up front because the back is changing.

 

Man what a nightmare! You did what you could...really more than most would do. Let us know what Dale says.

 

Apparently they got in in early... at least one of the year old plug wires disintegrated when they touched it. There was another wire issue that was probably caused by me too. The aftermarket wires are shorter than OEM so they weren't routed well. One was slightly melted they said. If this is it, than it seems like a mix me using shitty parts (they weren't even the 'cheap' ones) and poor routing of the slightly shorter wire. My AFM manifolds throw a little bit of an issue in there with plug wire routing too. I know they gave me issues with plug wires when I put them on.

I gave them the OK to do the plug wires and see if that is the only issue. I just re-inspected those in January because one broke too.

 

New vehicles suck. I get sick of the lack of creature comforts in my beater TJ and think about upgrading to a JK, then stuff like this reminds me why I love it. Simplicity is a wonderful thing. My wife's 2021 JL had the valvetrain eat itself at 37k miles and got a replacement engine, meanwhile the ole TJ 4.0 is happily/gutlessly lugging along at 193k.

 

While I agree.... so far this on I have to chalk up to shitty parts from O'reiily and me not ensuring they could not rub at all.

Don't get me started on modern Diesel issues...

 

While I agree.... so far this on I have to chalk up to shitty parts from O'reiily and me not ensuring they could not rub at all.

Fingers crossed that's it.

Don't get me started on modern Diesel issues...

I'm kind of, sort of, hunting for new 3/4 or 1-ton truck. I'm really hesitant to purchase any diesel. MAYBE a clean 7.3L. At this point I'd rather have a gas guzzling V8 and be a slow poke, than deal with the issues that come with modern diesels. Currently really like the idea of the 2020 and newer 6.6L Chevy V8...

"Notably, the L8T does not use cylinder deactivation technologies like Active Fuel Management (AFM) or Dynamic Fuel Management (DFM). It’s also not equipped with Auto Stop-Start (ASS)."

 

In the last 10 years I have gone from a diesel 3/4 ton (2004) to a gas 3/4 ton (2008), and now a gas 1/2 ton (2016)

I will never own a diesel again unless my job absolutely requires it, or I have more money than I know what to do with. The extra costs of a diesel vs. A gas to me are not worth it unless im making money off it everyday.

 

Good to know.

 

I have a 2014 JK and it's not too bad to work on. A bit tight under the hood for a fat guy. I got it with a ton of problems as the previous owner I think traded it in simply because it was nickle and diming him to death. It was in really good shape for 150k and I waited for it to drop in price for 3 months sitting on Al Serra's wholesale lot. No rust except a few spots where the paint was blasted off the axles or where there was never any paint. The sticker on the frame behind the right rear tire still looks new.

Anyway, after fucking around with all of its small problems I found that jscan and hptuners were a real help. jscan lets you hit BCM stuff you can't see most anywhere else and hptuners lets you see what the engine is really doing.

I also found out years ago if a name brand shop like Summit or a reseller that depends on their name for survival like RockAuto doesn't sell it, to stay away from it. That is no guarantee it's a good part, but it is a guarantee that they didn't choose to sell a bad one to make more money.

Now that new vehicles are getting insanely expensive to buy a subscription to updates/diagnostics (GM used to give you a 1 year subscription for a VIN for $40)... it is getting really irritating to work on stuff. They now want $45 for SPS2 for 2 years, but diagnostics is a separate fee and is insanely expensive... not including the hardware to connect or any software you might need.

 

In the last 10 years I have gone from a diesel 3/4 ton (2004) to a gas 3/4 ton (2008), and now a gas 1/2 ton (2016)

I will never own a diesel again unless my job absolutely requires it, or I have more money than I know what to do with. The extra costs of a diesel vs. A gas to me are not worth it unless im making money off it everyday.

Honestly, it has not been that bad other than the def pump going out a few months after I bought it, and then battling a limp mode issue that was borderline dangerous for a few months. An independent shop finally figured out the sensor and pigtail issue and solved that.

I'm at almost 170k on my Duramax. They want me to pay almost $4k to fix an oil pan gasket though with a very small seep.

I have a 2014 JK and it's not too bad to work on. A bit tight under the hood for a fat guy. I got it with a ton of problems as the previous owner I think traded it in simply because it was nickle and diming him to death. It was in really good shape for 150k and I waited for it to drop in price for 3 months sitting on Al Serra's wholesale lot. No rust except a few spots where the paint was blasted off the axles or where there was never any paint. The sticker on the frame behind the right rear tire still looks new.

Anyway, after fucking around with all of its small problems I found that jscan and hptuners were a real help. jscan lets you hit BCM stuff you can't see most anywhere else and hptuners lets you see what the engine is really doing.

I also found out years ago if a name brand shop like Summit or a reseller that depends on their name for survival like RockAuto doesn't sell it, to stay away from it. That is no guarantee it's a good part, but it is a guarantee that they didn't choose to sell a bad one to make more money.

Now that new vehicles are getting insanely expensive to buy a subscription to updates/diagnostics (GM used to give you a 1 year subscription for a VIN for $40)... it is getting really irritating to work on stuff. They now want $45 for SPS2 for 2 years, but diagnostics is a separate fee and is insanely expensive... not including the hardware to connect or any software you might need.

I have an HPT MVPI3... I have not learned a lot of what I am looking at with it though. I've never really had pain in the ass issues until this JK lol. It was pretty neglected when I got it.

 

I have an HPT MVPI3... I have not learned a lot of what I am looking at with it though. I've never really had pain in the ass issues until this JK lol. It was pretty neglected when I got it.

JK is pretty easy to work on all things considered, but a bit tight under the hood. Most of it makes sense. I think the engineers that designed the wiring harness should be shot in the face with 10,000 microdildos though.

It's kind of time consuming to learn hptuners. I've been messing with it for over a decade at this point. I have an old MPVI2 pro and MPVI3. It's probably the most useful tool I have but for the other systems you really need something else. It's really irritating that everyone switched to paytoplay and made it expensive. I know Stellantis has been locking people out of "premium" features that require a secondary subscription to get into for diagnostics. I expect eventually the car companies will get sued like Deere... again. Last time Chrysler tried this shit they got in a ton of legal trouble for having a closed system.

Newer stuff is getting worse for repairability, to the point that half of the shit I look at it was probably even made difficult to assemble on the line to go with making it hard to repair. Usually all things car related is based on assembly line time. Choosing to ship parts that need to be flashed to work pretty much keeps parts changers from functioning.

 

Agreed, used truck prices have come down big time, I started shopping gas 3/4 tons, and wound up with a Cummins.

Granted, it's been 4 days lol, but I'm super happy with it, especially after I spent a day with a 6.4 Hemi truck to compare to.

 

Jeep JK is easy to work on but has tight space and a confusing wiring harness. HPTuners is useful but costly and hard to learn. Newer cars are harder to repair because of locked systems and expensive software.

 

WOW !!! that is a lot of words to Say Nothing




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