ODB2 Port Monitoring

[OverToyed]

Hi all, pardon me for what may turn out to be a stupid question.

 

1999 Dodge 2500 Cummins with an embarrassing amount of money dumped into it.

 

I used to have an Edge Juice tuner but had to switch to Quadzilla so I could change timing.  Edge won't change timing.  The Edge tuner does, however, connect to the ODB2 port so you can set read and reset engine codes.  Very Handy.  Quadzilla does not.  I bought a $100 bluetooth ODB2 scanner and hooked that up.  I get RPM, temperature, TPS etc from it but NEVER any engine codes.  

 

About a month ago my PCM and transmission fulfilled a long planned suicide pact and that set me back a serious amount of money.  Check engine light was never lit.  Mechanic pulled the codes for me in the shop (check engine light wasn't lit for him either).

 

I called tech support for my bluetooth scanner and they say the scanner won't report anything, ever, unless the check engine light is lit.  But my Edge tuner DID.  Many, many times.

 

What am I missing here?  I sure don't want to shell out that kind of $ again.

 

Thanks in advance for your wisdom.

[Mopar1973Man]

What brand of OBDII dongle?

[Me78569]

yep, my obdlink read codes fine.  

[OverToyed]

Bluedriver made what I have connected now.  I stopped in at the oriely's up the street and borrowed their bosch reader.  It said "no errors" but the kid that was running it also commented that if the check engine light is't lit you'll see nothing.

[Me78569]

hogwash 

 

A code can be stored without a CEL.  

[OverToyed]

I know the edge unit detected them.  Many, many times.  Like the one that's kicked up when there's a vacuum leak for cruise control.  Didn't light the cel, but did throw codes.

[Mopar1973Man]

49 minutes ago, Me78569 said:

yep, my obdlink read codes fine.  

Same here the OBDLink LX reads codes just fine.

[Dieselfuture]

OBD link here too

[Marcus2000monster]

Obd link is the ticket. No issues with mine. 

[OverToyed]

Thanks for your help guys.  New ScanTool LX device on order.

[int3man]

Not to Hi-Jack this  thread but.  What will read the ECM Engine codes?  It is my understanding that the cheaper ones will not read the ECM codes?

 

Thanks!

Michael

Edited September 26, 2018 by int3man

[OverToyed]

Excellent question Michael.  I'd love to learn more.  Same for PCM.  Do those also route through the ODB2 in 1999?

Edited September 26, 2018 by OverToyed

[Mopar1973Man]

Verified... Works fully and reads PCM, ECM and live data.

 

http://www.obdlink.com/lxbt/

 

http://www.obdlink.com/mxbt/

 

Rare time, I've seen OBDII tools hang up and not read any codes even though the CHECK ENGINE light is on. I've found if you pull the ECT sensor lead and create a fresh code then the rest of the codes show up.

 

NOTE: 98.5 to 2002 Dodge Cummins are NOT ODBII compliant. If you check PID 1C (Hex) it will report 05 back in response. Which means Dodge Cummins not ODBII compliant.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/OBD-II_PIDs

 

[OverToyed]

No idea what you've just said but I thank you for the wisdom.

[Mopar1973Man]

Yeah, I went a bit technical. Basically if you have OBDLink LX or MX dongle you can use a bluetooth terminal app on your device. Now log into the dongle and issue commands to the bus. The PID list is the manual way of looking at information on the bus. Most apps do this for you but skip things like the address 1C which is ODBII compliance. Funny when you see the result from that address on the bus is a 5 and the Cummins is NOT OBDII compliant. 

 

As for the code hang up it just weird burp or hiccup you might run into sometimes. I posted that to hopefully help anyone out with a hung OBDII error code that won't report. I think it was more so the ScanGauge II that I have that did this hang up. Right now @Me78569 has my ScanGauge II.

 

 

 

 

Edited September 26, 2018 by Mopar1973Man