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I’m under 35. :D

I got my start on cars in Southern California, so there were a *lot* of imports, with a *lot* of different systems around. There were also the hot rodders and domestic types, it being SoCal, so there were “old” domestic systems, too. I learned to work on all of them at the same time. When I took Auto Shop in high school, there was a 69 Dodge Dart GT next to a 79 Caddy Fleetwood, which was parked across from a 1993 Infiniti J30 and a 89 Honda Accord. You get the idea.

My first car was a $500 Dodge Dart from 1969 (and oh God, was that a pile of crap). My next car was a police-auction-special ‘85 Jaguar XJ6 (which spoiled me), followed by a hand-me-down Toyota pickup truck. I had to work on/rebuild/assemble all of these myself, so I got experience with a *lot* of different systems just at home.

What I am is an IT specialist who does cars as a hobby *and* decided to keep his auto repair skills current through continuing education and research as a backup skill set. As a result, I occasionally get called by my local Jaguar dealer for a consult (I’m considered one of the local experts on a certain older model) and I get job offers at least a couple of times a year from the local Jaguar and Nissan dealerships. :P I’d take one of them up on it, but it’d be a pay cut and too much like real work. :D

As for an OBDII scanner, the hot home (and sometimes shop) setup is a laptop computer (usually a cheap older model) connected to a OBDII interface and running interpreter software. Such a setup can not only read and clear codes, but also get a *good* reading of the live data stream from the computer to “see” what it “sees”.

Here’s a link to the hardware: http://www.obdpros.com/

There are competing units, of course, but that’s just an example. Then you need software, and there’s free software, shareware, and commercial software, much of which is all about the same. You can put together a package from scratch, including an old laptop, for under $300.

As for what goes wrong... O2 sensor’s at the top, followed by the coolant temperature sensor, both common and considered consumables, then much further back the mass airflow sensor or manifold air pressure sensor. That assumes that it sets a code. If the car sometimes will crank and crank and crank and not start, you’re not getting injector or ignition function as the car cranks (not just the priming cycle) it is usually the crankshaft angle sensor or camshaft angle sensor - without that, the computer doesn’t “know” where or when to fire the injectors or plugs. There’s been a LOT of bad CAS units running around lately, some of them seem to have about a 10-12 year lifespan.

As for documentation, you might be surprised. Most makers now make their vehicles’ factory service manuals available in PDF format either on a CD or online for a small fee ($10-30, usually). It’s invaluable for diagnostics - if you ever need to know where to get such items for a specific make, let me know. There’s also another resource which I won’t mention on an open forum because of the “gray” legal area that it is in.