[DeTomaso] "Throwaway Cars" tale

[Boyd Casey]

I don't find it hard to believe that a Lamborghini dealer can fix the ECU
of a Diabblo, in fact I thought it was hard to believe that in this day and
age with people making custom chips to over come performance limitations
built in by the manufacturers and all the tuners thart work on electronic
efi. The part I refuse to believe is that you can get anything done at a
Lamborghini  shop for a few hundred bucks! Come on, who are you trying to
kid?
Boyd

On Saturday, June 15, 2013, LS wrote:

> Detomasos don't handle.
>
> Ferraris are twitchy.
>
> Diablo computers die.
>
> I love the internet!
>
> A good Lambo shop can rebuild a computer for a few hundred $$$ *IF* they
> fail.
>
> It doesn't happen that often.
>
> LS
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> central
> wines-spirits   est 1934
>
>
> 625 e street nw
>
> washington, dc 20004
>
> centralwines.com
>
>
> facebook.com/CentralLiquors
>
>
> 202-737-2800
>
>
>
>
> ________________________________
>  From: Charles Engles <cengles at cox.net <javascript:;>>
> To: "'Himes, Terry (397C)'" <terry.himes at jpl.nasa.gov <javascript:;>>;
> detomaso at poca.com <javascript:;>
> Sent: Saturday, June 15, 2013 9:42 PM
> Subject: Re: [DeTomaso] "Throwaway Cars" tale
>
>
> Dear Terry,
>
>
>
>                      ...and from what I can tell there should be a goodly
> supply of dead and malfunctioning Diablo main engine computers for you to
> experiment on in order to help them keep their Diablos on the road.
>
>
>
>
>
>                                     Warmest regards,  Chuck Engles
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
> From: Himes, Terry (397C) [mailto:terry.himes at jpl.nasa.gov]
> Sent: Saturday, June 15, 2013 4:17 PM
> To: Charles Engles; detomaso at poca.com
> Subject: Re: [DeTomaso] "Throwaway Cars" tale
>
>
>
> Hmmm?   Gets me thinking that about part-time career opportunity.
> Something
> that might fund the next
>
> Pantera upgrade I've been wanting.  New brakes.   Hmmm?   Lambo owers ==
> $$$.
>
>
>
>
>
> Terry W. Himes
>
> JPL Jet Propulsion Laboratory
>
> Deep Impact Sequence Team Lead
>
> Deep Impact Spacecraft Engineer
>
> Phone: (818) 393-6261
>
> Cell:     (818) 653-8213
>
> Fax:     (818) 393-3147
>
> thimes at jpl.nasa.gov
>
>
>
>
>
> From: Charles Engles <cengles at cox.net>
> Date: Sat, 15 Jun 2013 15:31:58 -0500
> To: <detomaso at poca.com>
> Subject: [DeTomaso] "Throwaway Cars" tale
>
>
>
> Dear Forum,
>
>
>
>
>
>
>
>                   A true story follows.
>
>
>
>
>
>                  A friend of mine owns a Lamborghini Diablo.  He has owned
>
> it for several years and was driving it on a backroad when it lost power.
>
> He came home on a roll back.  He thought  it was a bad oxygen sensor.
>
> Further home diagnostics seem to show that it is the main engine computer
>
> and that accounts  half of the V12 cylinders missing in action.
>
>
>
>
>
>                 When that diagnosis came up, he thought, "This is bad."   A
>
> call to our nearest Lambo dealer and service center in Dallas-Ft. Worth
> gave
>
> him an unpleasant earful.  It seems that they have a Diablo with the same
>
> problem.  It has been in their shop for *several* months.   They have
>
> plugged three new computers into it and untold man-hours and still haven't
>
> solved the problem.   They were able to obtain the few remaining factory
> NOS
>
> engine computers.   Lambo does not make them any more.  It appears that
>
> there is no source for a new Diablo engine computer.
>
>
>
>
>
>                 Further research showed that there are apparently two guys
>
> in the U.S. with the ability to understand the computer circuitry and code
>
> who can actually work on a sick computer rather than just replace it.  One
>
> fellow is in Ohio and the other is on the West Coast.   He'll have to put
>
> the Diablo on a transport and send it to one of them and hope they can fix
>
> it.
>
>
>
>
>
>                 The plan that occurred to me: pull the offending and
>
> uncooperative Diablo computer and install something more user
> friendly---has
>
> already been done by other Diablo owners.  Some have converted to a Motec
>
> system that is supposed to cost about $20k..!
>
>
>
>
>
>                 After the onset of this major headache, he said that he was
>
> reminded of something that Bob Smith  (  www.bobsmithcoachworks.com ) said
>
> years ago when we were touring his fabulous Ferrari and Exotic Restoration
>
> Shop in Texas.   Someone in the group asked about newer Ferraris and sports
>
> cars in the post carburetor  era.