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Intermittent Electronic Problems

By Roy, BAT Auto Technical

       Walk into any auto repair shop and ask the mechanics what intermittent electronic problems mean to them, and if they don’t get real graphic with their answer, then either they don’t do electrical repairs, or they have the patience of a saint. At the very least they will tell you that intermittent problems are headaches.

A day at the shop might start something like this. The customer tells the service writer that the vehicle works one minute and not the next. The service writer states this on the repair order. The mechanic checks it out and the vehicle operates fine, so no problem found is written on the repair order. The customer gets the vehicle back and the same thing happens. Now the customer has a headache, he goes back to the service writer who also now has a headache. And it doesn’t take him to long to give the mechanic a headache.

I’ll say right now that sometimes no matter how hard all involved work to resolve this problem, it can take some time and patience to find an intermittent problem. But, if the three people involved in this problem work together as a team of detectives the chances of finding and fixing this problem the first time at the shop can be greatly increased.

The customer’s role as detective is to provide clues as to what’s happening in and around the vehicle when the problem occurs. There are four clues that he/she should be on the look out for.

• Weather (cold, hot, moisture)
• Temperature (of the vehicle and it’s components)
• Vibration (can cause an electrical component to crack or separate from it’s solder connection)
• Voltage Variations (conditions that cause battery voltages to drop below or exceed the working voltage for electronic circuits)(monitor the gauges, warning lamps, are the lights dimming?)

The role of detective by the service writer should be one of interrogator, and then file a complete written report. (The repair order) This would include.

• Asking the customer specific questions.

  While nowhere near a complete list, here are some examples:

1. Does the vehicle have difficulty starting or continuing to run in the mornings only?
2. How long after the vehicle was started did you first notice the problem?
3. If the vehicle turned over normally but won’t start, how long was it since the vehicle was last in operation?
4. Weather when problem occurred?
5. Were you driving over a bumpy road, railroad tracks, potholes?
6. Does using the A/C seem to affect the problem?

 

• Filling out the repair order.

  The service writer should make sure that in good readable writing he/she has put everything word for word that the customer has said on the repair order.

The role of the mechanic as detective is to take all this information and recreate the crime (problem) and then solve the case. (Fix the problem)

I won’t go through all the steps that the mechanic should follow because that could be a complete article. .

I guess what I’m trying to say with this article is, one of the best tools that can be used in solving an intermittent problem is communication.

Batauto.com©February 2001