Hello. I’m thinking of buying Opel Vectra B from one guy I sort of know. The price is cheap because of possible ECU problem. He told me he went to auto repair shop and they ran OBD on the car and they said that the OBD thing doesn’t even recognize the ECU of the car. The problem emerged when he was driving the car and the engine just suddenly stopped running. The car doesn’t start at the moment. I have read that one the symptoms of dead ECU is similar what happened to this car. Do I have to take anything into account if I buy used ECU for the car? Do I have to reprogram the immobilizer(or the key) or something like that? I found one on sale which comes with a key and some other stuff ( http://imgur.com/xoJcxNi ).
The common thought here is if you see red flags walk away . If you really want this thing set a price the way it is now and after it is repaired they can add that to the price and you go from there.
Well I don’t think it is a red flag because me and my dad can repair it by ourselves. The seller lives nearby and he wasn’t even selling it anywhere yet. The price he wants is like 400euros and it looks really cool and has nice rims , so even if I cannot get it to work I could sell it for more money. All I want to know is that do I need to reprogram something (ofcourse at specialist) or buy a new key with the ECU?
If you buy the car the first thing I would suggest doing before buying another ECU is to check every single fuse on the car on the offchance the problem is nothing more severe than a popped fuse.
U can sell it for more than u paid? Do u have a place to park it? Go for it
The OBD2 reading fault is most likely due to a lack of power getting to the OBD2 connector in the car which the reader depends on for power. This is what @OK4450 was refer to. Pin 16 of the connector is power and pin 4 is ground.
Even if you do need a new ECU I doubt it has to be programmed but I can’t say that for sure.
When the Wife and I did Spain and Portugal in 2003 we were supposed to get an Audi A3 rental. AVIS did not have one so we ended up with a brand new (60 kilometers) Opel Vectra 2.2L I4 turbo diesel 5spd M/T. Very nice car! Much better performance than any diesel I had driven. 5,600 RPM redline. At the first re-fuel I had to smell the cap to make sure it was a diesel. Drove it 2,200 miles in Spain. Fuel mileage averaged about 40mpg. Many of the miles were on the “Autovia” much like our Interstates 120 kph (74mph). It appears the OP may be getting a good deal but “good” deal can also turn into money pits. Caveat Emptor!
OBD thing doesn't even recognize the ECU of the car
What’s you got there is the OBD computer trying to communicate with the car computer (the ECU). i.e. One computer trying to talk to another one. Lots of things can go wrong, some easy to fix, some not. It’s like when you plug a new printer into your computer and try to print something. That’s the same situation, one computer trying to talk to another. And the first time you try it, not likely to work, right? At least at first. So you start your investigation. Could be a cabling problem, a connector problem, something isn’t turning on, something isn’t getting power, needed software missing, software installed but isn’t the correct version, some configuration data missing, etc. Or one or both of the computers are just burned out and dead. But it is usually one of the former rather than the latter.
So think of it as an analogy. What would you do with the printer problem? Probably get a printer you know is working and plug your computer to that, see if it works. Or plug your new printer into a different computer, one you know is working.
Likewise, that’s probably the place to start with your problem. Try a different OBD unit you know works with your version of car. Or plug the first OBD unit into another car like yours you know works.