Hi Scotty and community,
I'm in the UK. If I go for a Japanese import, and I need to plug a scantool into it - will it be in Japanese or can the computers translate into the language what I speak?. There seems to be conflicting views on this.
Much appreciated,
Alex
The car's computer communicates with the scan tool in binary code, it's up to the scan tool to interpret that and present the data to the user in the appropriate language.
Yeah but given the fact it probably has no OBDII, and might require a special scan tool - I’m not sure that there’s a compatible scan tool has been translated to English.
Even with modern cars, some of the DTC wording / data pit names feel like something really got lost in translation.
I’m not sure there’s a scanner that can communicate with the ECM and display everything in English.
I don't recommend buying JDMs
Not unless you have cheap & easy access to spare parts (and labour) for the vehicle.
and a translator
A lot of them are so mechanically simple, share parts with US/Euro models, are super special and nice to drive...
like the Toyota Serra that's pretty much an expensive sports car-like Corolla.
Not here in N.America. And good luck finding service information in English, or tools to connect to the diagnostic system. They are traps.
Having watched Scotty's videos on some cars imported from Japan, yes they do talk in Japanese. Just make sure you have Google Translate ready, although I don't always trust Google Translate lol.
Thanks for the reply. I had read this article before but didn't bookmark it: https://www.theaa.com/car-buying/buying-an-imported-car the AA is one of two of the most known UK breakdown services in the UK. They're kinda useless though. They wanted to charge me £200 to inspect a car, and plugging in a scantool wasn't even part of the service..
But I mis-remembered that bit at the end whre they said "UK dealers' diagnostic equipment may be incompatible making servicing difficult". So thought it might have been that.
The problem isn't human language, but a JDM car's computer may well speak a different protocol (binary language, so to speak) than regularly imported models. If this is the case it would make the common scan tools used in your country useless.