- Joined
- Jun 25, 2021
- Messages
- 179
- Reaction score
- 23
- Points
- 18
- Age
- 49
- Location
- Abilene tx
- Vehicle Year
- 2003
- Make / Model
- Mazda b3000
- Engine Type
- 3.0 V6
- Transmission
- Manual
- 2WD / 4WD
- 2WD
Orca, I'm a mechanics dream. My OCD and lack of experience kill me when it comes to stuff like this. I go parts slinging and don't think about what I'm doing. I suggested replacing them because I've gone this far... so why not, right. I cross the cables cause usually when I stop messing with it for the day, a new part is coming or it's gonna sit for a couple days. I don't want to leave the battery connected cause I'm afraid I'll forget and leave something on or not shut the door all the way, and drain the battery. But I will not do it anymore. I think what I probably need to do, is put the new damper in, which will be here in 5-7 days, along with a new, better OBD2 scanner, been needing to upgrade anyway. I've had this one for 6 yrs and it won't connect sometimes or has a connection error message sometimes PLUS it is very limited on reading my frontier, plug my phone in, pull up the forscan app and just go drive it. Probably need to set the bed back on so I'll have tail lights though...I know I can't dance I'm a 1 step forward 2 steps back knucklehead when I get too focused on a problem.I really think you need to stop replacing parts unless/until you know they're bad. It might seem like you're narrowing the problem down when you do it but, given the potential for an unreliable new part, you're really just widening the problem, making diagnosis even more difficult, IMHO. I assisted a guy a while back who replaced the same part twice -- he had 2 bad new parts and the 3rd (this time, OEM) one finally worked. How did he figure that out? By testing the 2nd new part, with FORScan, and finding that it was bad.
So, if it's useful to use a scantool to check the quality of a new part, why not (where possible, of course) do the same thing before you replace the part and possibly avoid the 'part replacement' step entirely?Every time you reset KAM (by cross-connecting the battery cables), you're effectively "yanking the rug out from under" the PCM. This is highly inadvisable. You're resetting all sorts of things that you do NOT want to be reset. It's potentially even worse than the people who naively "clear codes" with a scantool at every opportunity. Resetting KAM should be reserved for very special circumstances, like replacing a part (e.g. IAC) for which the PCM needs its memory reset because it needs to "re-learn" something.
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