Ask HN: What are you working on (August 2024)?

I recently bought a used Seadoo and discovered the dirty little secret of personal watercraft that they don't want you to know. Unlike cars with their standardized ODB2 ports, those aren't a requirement for PWCs. And the diagnostic scanner hardware/software costs hundreds or thousands of dollars. Major affront to the right to repair, so I'm ending up doing some CANbus hacking.

That’s kinda surprising. In Polaris ATV’s they seem to have this built into the interface of the machine itself so you can read the codes on its LCD. I don’t know how complex they are but I assumed they were a bit more open than OBD-II instead of less.

I've never seen an LCD screen in an ATV; my neighbor repairs small engines and stuff like riding lawnmowers and ATVs - i hang out from time to time and he's said more times than i can count "i got no idea what's wrong with it, probably a wiring issue somewhere i gotta track down" or somesuch. Some of the machines he's repairing cost upwards of $40,000 so i'm not sure it's a price thing.

My point is, i'm sure he would have mentioned how great or how awful such a debug console was, at least once, in the decade i've known him.

I'm not sure why you think that's a good metric.

I googled it and the first result was an official help page about the cluster that says it'll show the diagnostic codes.

https://www.polaris.com/en-us/off-road/owner-resources/help-...

> For more information on diagnostic codes and display code definitions for your vehicle, contact your Polaris Dealer.

uh huh. MIL, FMI, SPN? anyhow the next time i'm at his house i'll look at any of the polaris vehicles there and see if any of them actually have useful diagnostic information. canbus and odb-II are standardized; i expect the polaris codes to be "ohhhhhhhh. you should bring that in to the dealership straight away" regardless of what it is.

thanks for the spat.