The Manchester office is growing, and they are getting ready to dig in and further improve our software.

A group from Pico went to visit the Military Intelligence Museum at Chicksands. They had a great time, but we can't disclose further information about their adventure 😉

A new version of PicoScope Automotive was released last week. We know there have been some serious issues with our Automotive software lately, such as custom probes, and we are truly sorry for any inconvenience experienced. We would like to thank our software team and testers for all their hard work in getting version 6.13.17 improved and released. Thank you for bearing with us. We are, as always, grateful for your feedback and support.

Competition!
 

Fill out our Google form and enter your name in the draw. The winner will be drawn by a random name picker after the competition has closed on the 31 July 2019. 

Please read our full T&Cs here before you enter the competition. 

Enter our draw and the chance to win a 4-Channel Starter Kit!

Cutting out with no restart
It seems that a lot of the faults I come across these days are communication-based and this vehicle is no different. The complaint this time is: the vehicle suddenly cut out and then wouldn’t restart.

 

The next Practical Pico video, Non-invasive engine condition testing, will premiere on our YouTube channel and Facebook page on Monday the 27th of May. This will be followed by a live-streamed Q&A session on YouTube and Facebook, on the 29th of May.

In this presentation, we will show you how you can assess the mechanical condition of an engine without the stripping of any parts. We'll show you how you can set up, in a matter of seconds, for intake manifold, exhaust, and crankcase pressure testing. We'll describe how the results should look, to help you gain confidence in your measurements. Not only that, we'll introduce some typical faults, such as compression issues, so that you can learn the basics of pressure waveform evaluation.

During the live session, Barney, Steve and Ben will be answering questions that were asked during and after the presentation as well as during the live session. 

Follow our Facebook page and subscribe to our YouTube channel for updates regarding this event. We will be providing more information about our video premiere in next month's newsletter as well. 

 

Focus piece: Current clamps
Pico’s range of current clamps is a group of accessories that suits multiple applications. They can be used to confirm that a component under test is connected to a complete circuit and, more importantly, that an event took place. The event may be the operation of any component that consumes current, such as solenoids, injectors, motors, actuators, pumps, volume or pressure control valves, and relays. All this information can be obtained by simply placing a component cable in the jaws of a current clamp.

As part of our continuous upgrade process, we are pleased to announce updates to our common rail diesel rail pressure control guided tests. The test guidance describes how to connect and obtain waveforms so you can diagnose system faults that might be causing unexpectedly low or high fuel rail pressures.

CRD (Bosch) pressure regulator valve – voltage
The purpose of this test is to evaluate the correct operation of the Bosch Common Rail Diesel (CRD) Pressure Regulator Valve (PRV) based on the voltage and duty control under engine run conditions.
 
CRD (Bosch) quantity control valve – voltage
The purpose of this test is to evaluate the correct operation of the Bosch Common Rail Diesel (CRD) Quantity Control Valve (QCV) based on the voltage and duty control under engine run conditions.
 
CRD (Bosch) fuel rail pressure sensor – voltage
The purpose of this test is to check the fuel system pressure characteristics on a common rail diesel engine by using the fuel rail pressure sensor.
 

Maths is cool - part 4

There are times when I could kick myself for not obtaining the crank sensor signal during a typical engine capture. While we may not be looking for a crank sensor related fault, it can help us graph the engine speed during waveform analysis to determine if the engine/vehicle was accelerating, decelerating, etc.