As is often the case when discussing automotive technology I suggest considering what would be standard equipment on the average automobile if easy money weren’t available to finance the purchase. With 20% cash or trade in required and 24month limit at 6% interest the manufacturers would pull all their lobbying strings to eliminate all manner of highly touted safety “necessities” to produce a marketable product rather than all the luxury, power, convenience and image that we think we deserve. Zero to 60; whenever, 4 winds AC, power steering by Arm Strong, no airbags and a couple of cup holders… And we would be told what a great deal we were being offered.
Nowadays, those kinds of vehicles wouldn’t move off of the lot
Let's see, they can force carmakers to put equipment on all cars whether people want it or not, and then they can demand that carmakers service that equipment when the customer is unwilling or unable to pay.
That’s idiotic…Don’t blame the Feds on this one…Every other manufacture has ABS and traction control and doesn’t require the VIN to reprogram it.
BTW…the Feds aren’t the ones who are mandating this equipment…it’s big business…aka (INSURANCE INDUSTRY). They spend MILLIONS of dollars every year lobbying congress to get their agenda passed. If they THINK it’s safer…they’ll make sure it’s forced upon the manufacturers.
Nowadays, those kinds of vehicles wouldn’t move off of the lot
Would we all walk rather than buy basic transportation @db4690?
@“Rod Knox”
I’ll buy a car equipped with the typical features . . . power windows, locks, mirrors, lots of airbags, cruise, ac, etc. And if it’s new, it’ll also have stability control and tpms, because it’s mandated
But I will NOT spend any time trying to determine if it has any “vin-bricked” modules, to use the phrase that the other guy(s) like to use
And I’m NOT going to use the words immorality, crime, etc., if I have to buy an expensive component
There will NEVER again be a day, when the basic transportation that you mentioned will be the only choice, as far as new cars go
So your question serves no purpose. Because your hypothetical situation is just that
Please excuse me…
At the bottom end you can still buy a very basic machine, Mitsubishi, Hyundai, Yaris, Mazda 2, and several others are still available for around $10,000. However, almost no one here wants that kind of car nowadays. If you go to third world countries, these cars are still the main family transportation, one step up from a scooter or motorbike.
One of our past posters, Craig58, I believe was strongly in favor of basic transportation. I have ridden in very basic 60s style Jeep models from Japanese manufacturers and did not feel safe at all.
Yup . . . you said it
Strippo models are still available, but they’re not very popular for regular customers . . . I know somebody’s going to argue that they are in fact quite popular, but that’s okay
Let me say this . . . strippo models may be somewhat popular for fleet use, but I think most regular customers nowadays would want something that was better equipped
I feel that some of these strippo models are produced, so that the manufacturer and dealers can say the car starts at x amount of dollars. Mostly marketing. They don’t produce many, because they are primarily loss leaders
I asked questions about stripper models not long ago, specifically the Mitsubishi Mirage. What I found interesting was that there wasn’t much of a price difference between this very basic car and other small fuel efficient cars with a lot more to offer for basically the same money.
One thing I do like is a manual transmission. Most of the small economy cars still offer these as the basic option.
I remember my dad buying strippo models as used cars when I was in.elementary school. The cars didn’t have radios, turning signals, backup lights, etc. The cars did get us where we were going. When I was in college, my dad finally bought a new car and his attitude changed and the cars he bought weren’ t the bottom of the line. When I was in graduate school and home on summer break, the Studebaker dealer had a new 1963 Studebaker Lark, bottom of the line, for $1495. My mother thought I should be in a better car for my 350 mile trip back to school… I had about $500 in savings and my dad wanted to loan me $1000. However, when we went to look at the car, my dad thought it looked cheap and started looking at more expensive modwls, he wanted to help me finance. I didn’t want to borrow any more than $1000 from him, so I kept my old car. When I completed my degree in 1965, I bought a strippo 1965 Rambler. It suited me just fine. However, when I got married, my first wife didn’t care for the car. One thing she didn’t like was the fact that no interior lights came on when the doors were opened. This feature was for the upper trim lines. I could see the advantage of not having to enter the car at night in the dark. I haven’t had a real strippo since.
An obscenely priced part is not proprietary to Ford only. Everyone will have some very high priced replacement parts or units even on bottom end cars.
I agree with db4690 and his statement that most customers would rather have a better equipped car than a stripper.
The downside to that is that many of those car buyers who want the car with more bells and whistles do not consider higher repair costs and worse; are heartbroken or raising all kinds of hxxx when told that Repair A is going to cost 4 digits.
This becomes even worse when the car is a month out of warranty and the failure occurs.
Geez, some people sure are quick to grab the pitch forks and torches. It’s a tinderbox around here…
There are very good reasons that certain microcontroller based modules are married to the VIN of a particular vehicle. This matches the performance of the module to a particular configuration of sub-systems in that car. That doesn’t mean that the module cannot be reprogrammed. It just requires specific hardware to do it.
And just because one dealer mech said it can’t be done, doesn’t mean that’s the one and only truth. If you haven’t yet met someone that was in a position where they should know something, but are clueless, you simply haven’t lived long enough yet.
People read one instance of someone else relating an experience they had and the next thing they’re ready to storm the castle, burn it down and turn over a few cars for good measure…it’s not pumpkin fest, calm down 
“That doesn’t mean that the module cannot be reprogrammed. It just requires specific hardware to do it.”
Are you claiming there’s no such thing as “marrying” a control module to the vehicle . . . ?
I’ve done it several times. It was unavoidable in every instance
Are you claiming there are no vin-specific modules on newer cars . . . ?
Sounds like you’re adding fuel to the fire . . . because your post could be interpreted to mean that all dealerships and mechanics that say that a module is vin-specific and can’t be used on another vehicle, aren’t telling the truth
@TwinTurbo This thread sure blew up while I was away!
It’s not just one person saying it. For one thing, @db4690 has verified that it’s happening, and he’s proven many times over that he knows what he’s talking about and has never been shown to be in the habit of lying, so there’s a pretty good reason to believe that it is, in fact happening.
All that said, I vehemently disagree with the notion that this practice is technically necessary. All this talk about marrying a part to a specific vin because it keeps track of mileage, or is set up for a specific configuration of parts, is ignoring the fact that both problems could be solved with a USB cable. Hook the new BCM you got from the junkyard up to the old BCM via a data cable and the flash memory gets transferred. Done, easy as that. And even if the old BCM is completely dead, this does not mean the memory has to be dead as well - computer motherboards die all the time without erasing the hard drive before they croak. In fact it’s quite common to transfer the hard drives from a dead computer into a new computer. I can think of no technical reason that this could not be made true even in parts that supposedly need to be married to one specific car.
And in fact apparently it is true, but they’ve engineered it such that “special hardware” is required and you have to send it off to a reman to get it done. That’s ludicrous. The only special hardware that should be required is a data cable, or alternately a screwdriver to pop the memory out of the old one and put it into the new one.
It is very, patently, clear that this is a profit-grabbing move, because there are plenty of easy solutions to the supposed technical requirements that a part be married to a car.
It should be noted, BTW, that I never claimed it was a crime or illegal because I do not believe it is illegal. I may (I’m not going to check through 16 pages) have said it should be illegal, and if I did I stand by it, and if I didn’t, I say it now. Either way, just because something is not actually illegal does not automatically mean it is ethical.
Are you claiming there's no such thing as "marrying" a control module to the vehicle . . . ?
Nope, perhaps it wasn’t clear. I said it is common practice. What I was trying to clarify is that the programming is not a one time, cast in stone event. The marriage can be annulled and the module married to a new car but you need special programming tools to do it.
because your post could be interpreted to mean that all dealerships and mechanics that say that a module is vin-specific and can't be used on another vehicle, aren't telling the truth
They’re 50% correct 
I can’t speak for EVERY instance but in my experience and that of people I trust, many of these VIN specific modules can be moved from one vehicle to another using dealer specific tools to perform the reprogramming necessary.
Hook the new BCM you got from the junkyard up to the old BCM via a data cable and the flash memory gets transferred. Done, easy as that.
You’re absolutely right, it’s a simple as pie and they could make it so anyone could do it with standard off the shelf hardware. Except that completely ignores the motivation for limiting who can do it based on liability concerns.
If I let anyone change the programming, then I no longer have control but yet I still retain responsibility. When something goes wrong because someone else reprogrammed it incorrectly, no one can tell if it was me that made the mistake or someone else. Compound that with lawyers arguing that I am the expert and I allowed someone else to modify my stuff and therefore I am still responsible. Don’t believe that can (and has) happen(ed)?
I know a guy that got sued because he was a professional and sold a guy a souped up car. The guy crashed, was paralyzed and sued the seller. The argument was the seller was a professional and should have known better than to sell a car like that to a novice. They won and he was out of business, lost everything…
Again, I think everyone that is riled up is because someone said it was a write-once situation. At least one other poster (jgree?) said that isn’t true. If it’s just a matter of finding the right people to do it, does your ire subside? It does for me…
When I enter the service department at a Ford dealership should I expect to hear “I’m Off to See the Wizard” playing?
I recall the first years that Ford used electonic ignition and it was a tough time for Ford service departments. The components were outrageously expensive and most mechanics were totally out of touch with the technology. “Try a known good part” was the most common diagnostic method. There was a radio noise suppressor capacitor mounted on Ford coils that would intermittantly short out internally and cause all manner of problems and resulted in the unnecessary replacement of many expensive components in the late 70s and early 80s.
And believe it or not, there was an electronic device sold in the mid 70s that would totally replace the electronic ignition. It connected to the battery + and - and the distributor coil tower. Somehow it fed secondary voltage to the ignition rotor and used the resistance from the rotor’s tip to the plug wire lugs to establish a workable timing of the ignition for the engine to run, albeit not very well. What will the aftermarket come up with for the OP’s problem?
And here it is… Or one very similar to it anyway.
I was very skeptical of the device 40 years ago and connected it to a Ford V-8 with a Sun Scope on the ‘coil’ wire and it did produce a somewhat regular secondary ignition pulse at steady rpms as best I can recall. I didn’t buy one though.
If I let anyone change the programming, then I no longer have control but yet I still retain responsibility. When something goes wrong because someone else reprogrammed it incorrectly,
Except we’re not letting anyone reprogram it incorrectly. We’re letting someone copy the programming that you programmed from one identical BCM to another. The only thing that would be done in the process is that a data cable would be hooked up and a “transfer” button would be hit that would make an exact copy of the old BCM’s programming and put it on the new BCM.
As such, yes, the liability is still with you because you programmed it, and if the code is wrong then it was wrong on the old one too.
If it's just a matter of finding the right people to do it, does your ire subside? It does for me...
Only if the right people aren’t charging exhorbitant new-parts rates to do it. If we’re talking about tossing someone a $20 to copy the data over, fine. If we’re talking about having to spend thousands for a part that you could pull from a junkyard car for $100, then no, my ire remains right where it is.
Edit: I realized you meant “programming” in the sense of the EEPROM contents, not the literal interpretation of the operational coding.
Yes, you could design and build a hardware/software tool to do that specifically without allowing anyone to alter the block contents. A problem remains- ensuring that the hardware revision/software revision is still compatible with the old configuration…
I can think of a way to do it off the top of my head but having done a bit of similar stuff in the past, I know how risk averse companies are to this type of thing. Their position is to not allow the risk in the first place, end of story.
I agree, it should be a minimal charge to do the swap. $20 is probably a pipe dream. More like $100 when you consider labor and overhead issues…still, far better than $5300 no?