Quote:
Originally Posted by cRiPpLe_rOoStEr
Even though nowadays a dealership makes a large profit from service, trying to push customers into something newer for which they may be able to charge a higher fare due to the increased complexity seems advantageous. No wonder they often perform services with fewer care once the vehicle is older, plus it leads to fewer need to keep spare parts for them on inventory.
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Yeah I don't go to the dealer unless I need a service that no one else can do like flashing the ECU or if I quickly need an OEM part. Other than that I do everything myself and usually buy my parts online.
Last time I went to the dealer to get an ECU flashed, they told me they couldn't get it to flash and that there must be some type of electrical problem with the car that's keeping it from working and they said for them to diagnose it, I would need to get a new ECU from them for ~$1K and if it still didn't work I would need to pay them by the hour to diagnose it.
They offered to try again for free with another ECU, so I went back to the junkyard and bought a second ECU and took it back for them to try again, which unsurprisingly supposedly still didn't work. I don't think they even tried to flash it though at least the second time because I paid attention to how I set the replacement ECU on the passenger seat and it was still in the exact same position as far as I could tell and the car was parked in the same place I left it in when I gave them the keys.
I asked on a Honda forum what could cause an ECU to not flash other than being defective and everyone pretty much said unless there's a problem with the OBD port they probably didn't even try. That's why I would prefer to have the job done by a locksmith because then I could see them do it and they wouldn't have any incentive to try to sell me a new ECU or diagnostics.