MACS Service Reports - 2015 - SEP4

Thru, and we'd suggest you check with your tool suppliers as the PC requirements are very specific: professional
versions (32-bit and 64-bit) of Windows 7 and 8. But just for
all the service information, we'd say you'll have no problem.

tested for compatibility and may work with combinations
differing from those listed, although obviously there are no
guarantees. As noted for Fiat Chrysler, we're not using an
SVG viewer with Windows 8.1 and IE-11, and have full
access to the site.

Mazda Super Flexible

Aftermarket System Okay with Three Browsers

The mazdaserviceinfo.com site is very straightforward in
layout and we were able to access everything we tried with
Windows 8.1. Although Internet Explorer is the recommended browser, we found everything we tried opened
with Windows 7 and 8.1, and with all three browsers we
use (IE-11, Firefox and Chrome). The site supports Internet
Explorer 8, 9, 10 and 11, it's optimized for IE-10 and IE-11
(Mazda awaiting results on IE-12), and the new Microsoft
browser Edge, also called Spartan. If you have an Apple
computer, it will work with either Safari or Chrome. There
may be slight alignment issues with some content and
some browsers, but all should be acceptable. If you're using a mobile device with Safari or Chrome, the animated
wiring diagrams won't work because those browsers do
not support Adobe Flash (yet).

Also trouble free for us with Windows 7 and 8.1 computers (working with IE-11, Firefox and Chrome) are Mitchell
ProDemand and AllData aftermarket systems. Limited
use of Identifix also raised no hackles. So although we
like the extra information in the OE sites, we suggest you
be prepared for the problems and be ready to call your
service information provider for additional information
where needed. However, the people at the other end of the
hot line are not experts in HVAC and cooling systems, and
might well miss helpful information that you would spot.
If you feel you want to go to an OE site for the first time,
one we've not discussed, we strongly suggest you wander
around the free area looking for system requirements. Otherwise you may be very annoyed if you pay for access and
then try to get your money back.
We think it's time for many of the car makers to make
investments in these websites, and perhaps an SAE standard is in order to provide industry-wide compatibility.
Because of the Massachusetts Right-to-Repair law, which
will be taking effect in just over two years and have coastto-coast impact, we expect the OEMs to provide the access.
If technicians keep finding all these conflicting specifications however, there will be a lot of unhappiness. The need
for vehicle calibrations and reflashing in the aftermarket
is certainly increasing, and excuses will not carry weight.
You are likely to need at least two PCs to avoid incompatibility among the APIs (application programming interfaces) for SAE J2534 reprogramming, and even that extra PC
is going to be considered objectionable. ■

Toyota Also Very Flexible
More good news! In all these years we've gone to techinfo.toyota.com, we've had no problems, and we'll tell you the
site is chock full of in-depth technical explanations. There's
no crossing your fingers, because Toyota approves using
Firefox and Chrome, in addition to IE 8, 9 and 10. Techinfo.
toyota.com is officially compatible with Windows 7 and 8,
and we've also used it with 8.1. The Adobe Reader spec
(for PDFs) is 7.0 or higher, and here again, we've had no issues with Reader 11. Toyota also specifies the Adobe SVG
3.03 viewer and Adobe Flash Player 11.0 on up (although
this software is not popular, because it raises hacking issues). Toyota also notes that its system requirements may
not be absolute, that the website is continuously being

AND NOW, FOR A REAL TOUGHIE
This is the It's Normal report we promised in the
May 2015 issue. We won't mention the vehicle because it was the subject of a motorist's complaint
and a request for a Lemon Law buyback. It was
a new vehicle that had been to the dealer a great
number of times for what was described as inconsistent air conditioning performance, and the dealership took it into the shop five of those times. How
the case turned out is immaterial, because that's
more a function of the performance of lawyers, a
judge and the wording of the law itself. We've seen
cases where a car performed just as we would expect (non-A/C issues) and the judge ruled that the
buyer could reasonably expect something different
and awarded him the verdict.
We looked at the data in this particular case and

September 2015

decided it was worth sharing with readers because
it's an example of the complexity of the new Automatic Temperature Control system strategies. The
particular make of car uses a cabin humidity sensor,
so the strategy can include adjustment factors for
humidity and make changes accordingly. We aren't
privy to the thinking of the software engineers who
wrote the program for this car, so all we can do is
look at the behavior of the system under the different operating conditions and see if there is some
amount of logic to it. This occurred in Florida, well
inland in the middle of the state. The weather conditions are unsurprisingly humid at times, hot and
dry at others, and subject to late afternoon/early
evening rains.
We normally don't get a deep level of detail as

MACS Service Reports

http://www.mazdaserviceinfo.com http://fo.toyota.com http://www.toyota.com

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