[Autox] No brake lights

[Bill Fuhrmann]

>> I sort of remember hearing about a car, perhaps the latest Corvette,
>> which has three wires going to the rear of the car - power, ground
>> and data.  There's a switching computer mounted back there that
>> interprets the data line and turns on the appropriate lights.
>>
>> I bet that would be a pain to debug at home!


> Funny you mention that - 3 wires (power, ground, & data) is a LOT easier 
> to
> troubleshoot than some of the rats nests we've had over the years.

> Coming from an IT support perspective I would LOVE to only have 3 wires to
> check/review when troubleshooting a problem.  ;-)

You must have a can bus (or other appropriate protocol) reader and universal 
decoding device.
How much did it cost?

Those of us without them will find it impossible to find out what the 
problem is.
Might be a wire broken, easy if it is in the link from the hub to the light.
Might be a light that is not listening to the signal from the hub.
Might be a switch that is not sending the signal to the hub.
Might be noise on the line.
Can't tell what the players are doing without the program.

Wandering through the "rats nests" can be tedious but not that difficult if 
you have a manual with a schematic and some high school science.

I was looking at putting one of the newer OEM radios in my 20 year old car 
and the shop said that they couldn't even test the ones that they pull out 
during upgrades because they don't have the equipment to send the data 
stream to tell it that it is allowed to turn on from the front panel.