Which (economically priced) OBDII Scan Tool for occasional usage DIYer

These things seem to range in price from $30 to $3K! I have no idea
where to begin and am looking for some reasonably priced
recommendations. I figure I might use it once maybe every few years is
all. I've got a 96 BMW currently that needs it. Late 90s GM would be
another app I might likely have. Can't predict what future cars I may
own beyond this.

Again I'm not looking for commercial quality (or price) - just a very
occasional usage to match my Craftsman tool usage.

Thanks

loadhawg wrote:
> These things seem to range in price from $30 to $3K! I have no idea
> where to begin and am looking for some reasonably priced
> recommendations. I figure I might use it once maybe every few years is
> all. I've got a 96 BMW currently that needs it. Late 90s GM would be
> another app I might likely have. Can't predict what future cars I may
> own beyond this.
>
> Again I'm not looking for commercial quality (or price) - just a very
> occasional usage to match my Craftsman tool usage.
>
> Thanks

I would guess that pretty much any scan tool could "scan" an obd2 car.
Sears has a decent selection of these. If all you want to do is see
what codes your car has, even the cheapest should work. I should warn
you, though, a lot of those things are fine for scanning "common" cars
like GM, Ford, etc., but BMW could be a different story. This is true
especially if you get one that reads some data that the sensors send
out. Even then, as long as you're using the generic obd2 mode, you
should be fine. 1996 was the first year that obd2 was required on all
cars in US, but I've read that some manufacturers still weren't fully
complied. Make sure your car has the proper hook-up.

On 29 Oct 2006 11:34:44 -0800, "loadhawg" > wrote:

>These things seem to range in price from $30 to $3K! I have no idea
>where to begin and am looking for some reasonably priced
>recommendations. ....

You might look at http://www.scantool.net/forum/ - there's quite a bit
of info there.

G