Ford of Europe Rolls Out Symptom Based Diagnostic System

September 5th, 2006

Ford Motor Company is rolling out a new system, dubbed the Integrated Diagnostic System (IDS) across all of Ford’s European Authorised Repairers, and represents a multi million-Euro investment from the company. This system was designed and built by Teradyne Diagnostic Solutions, who will be demonstrating it at this year’s Automechanika trade show.

The IDS software is installed on the Portable Test Unit (PTU) - a Panasonic CF18 ‘Toughbook(TM)’ laptop - and is fully integrated into the existing Ford ETIS software which is the on-line technical information system used in Ford Authorised Repairer Workshops.

The system integrates symptom-based diagnostics, technical information (via ETIS) and feedback to guide the technician through the diagnostic and repair processes and allows online approval of warranty repairs. Designed to make full use of wireless connectivity, IDS also reduces diagnosis and repair time by making all the information required by the technician available on the PTU, saving visits from the vehicle to access ETIS and other sources of information currently only available away from the vehicle.

By linking all Authorised Repairers (ARs) to Ford via the Internet, IDS allows immediate online update of the software and allows feedback of a record of every diagnostic session undertaken on every vehicle. This will facilitate much faster identification of field issues and allow suitable fixes to be developed and deployed to the ARs overnight instead of waiting for the next software issue via CD or DVD. This further supports Ford’s objective to “fix it right first time”.

Entry Filed under: Service Test