Originally posted by robtcorl Very generous of you Mr R.
Well, I do make some exceptions.
A short Rupert Story™.
Way back when I was serving my apprenticeship, I was attending a class on the then relatively new electronic engine controls. The instructor had an experience to relate when he was giving some training to mechanics at a Yugo dealership in Vancouver, British Columbia.
Apparently a Yugo, still under warranty, had come in on a hook.
It suddenly had stalled, and refused to restart, leaving the owner stuck in an intersection blocking traffic. A tow truck was dispatched, and it was delivered to the dealership repair shop.
They had hooked it up to the electronic scanner, and tried to read the trouble codes. The scanner refused to connect with the ECM (engine control module). Try as they might, but they could not get the scanner to link up with it. It was only coincidence that the training had been scheduled at about that time, and so they asked the instructor to use the car as part of the training.
So he hooked it up to the scanner, with pretty much the same result as the technicians at the repair shop. They fiddled about, tried a different scanner, but nothing seemed to work.
Finally, after hours and hours of fussing about, someone decided to remove the ECM and open it up.
Guess what?
It was empty.
The car had been fitted with a stand alone "speed/density" fuel management system, a very simple setup that requires nothing more than a small circuit board with a logic chip that measures the airflow going into the engine, the speed of the car, and the throttle position, and decides how much fuel to deliver via the injector. It had a simple hall effect electronic ignition module, with a mechanical advance distributor.
Pretty basic stuff.
The catalytic converter was removed, and cut open.
It was nothing more than an empty metal box. No catalyst inside to reduce exhaust emissions.
The box that was supposed to have the ECM in it was nothing more than a fake to get past the regulatory agency when the cars were imported from Yugoslavia. The had cleverly integrated the wiring that went in and out of it into the wiring harnesses, making it all look like it was connected, but when they did a continuity test on some of the wires, it was discovered that they went nowhere.
Yes, the Yugo. As in, you go nowhere in a Yugo.