John Deere employee responds to Right to Repair: Difference between revisions
NoGoodDeed (talk | contribs) m Correct formatting anomalies (spaces, commas, etc.) between the generated text and the text as shown in the source video. Also add [sic] where required (though a few more are needed -- I'll get to these shortly). There is also some missing text at the end of the document which I will add next. |
NoGoodDeed (talk | contribs) Add the missing lines to the last paragraph currently shown (more text is missing, but I'll save in smaller chunks so as not to lose any work) |
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Another real complaint is customers are not able to program their own controllers once they purchase them. This is very true. Now to understand why this is you must know how it use [''sic''] to be done. When I first started we could not program controllers even at the dealership. Many of the controllers are serial number specific based on the options of the machine, tuning, and security measures. Because of this we had to order every one by serial number. Normally we get parts overnighted but because of the extra step of the factory having to program it first it could add a few days until we received it. This meant the customer was down for days. And if that wasn't the problem after all you just wasted all that time. To combat this problem the dealerships gained the ability to program controllers. This meant we could stock a blank one and program it for whatever machine needed it getting it running the same day greatly improving customer service. If it wasn't the problem you were out of hours instead of days. In the early days this happened often. The early on board diagnostic [''sic''] were poor to no [''sic''] existent. The procedure in the manuals would sometimes say try this part and if that doesn't fix it try this one. This is referred to as swapnostics. Now when this system of programmable controllers was put into place the database was created inside the dealer portal so the only way to gain access to it was with a dealer log in to the corporate website. At the time there really was no customer portal in existence like there is today. Now could this database be incorporated into a customer accessible database? I don't know. I am not a software engineer. Considering the time, resources, money, failings, and aggravation involved with other systems that were incorporated I don't know if it would be worth the expense and manpower involved to do it for how very little it would be utilized by customers. In 25 years of doing this I can not think of one time I've had a customer that would be willing to even attempt to diagnose replace and reprogram their own controller. The risk of damaging a new controller, the investment in hardware and software, and the training and knowledge required to do it just isn't feasible. I don't think the process would be utilized enough to make it worth while. Also currently the software is free for the dealership to download and my dealership does not charge anything but our standard hourly service rate to install it. So a customer would have to program many controllers to ever see a return on investment. To continue on with the software issue in another scenario: when we make a major mechanical change to the machine we have to update the software. This would be like if you decided to change out the manual transmission in your car for an automatic. When this happens the dealership has to contact Deere to have new software created. This has to be done at the engineering level. Exactly how this process is done I'm not sure. But for a customer to have this level of access to software I would imagine it being similar to Microsoft giving you the uncompiled source code for office. Its [''sic''] just not going to happen. | Another real complaint is customers are not able to program their own controllers once they purchase them. This is very true. Now to understand why this is you must know how it use [''sic''] to be done. When I first started we could not program controllers even at the dealership. Many of the controllers are serial number specific based on the options of the machine, tuning, and security measures. Because of this we had to order every one by serial number. Normally we get parts overnighted but because of the extra step of the factory having to program it first it could add a few days until we received it. This meant the customer was down for days. And if that wasn't the problem after all you just wasted all that time. To combat this problem the dealerships gained the ability to program controllers. This meant we could stock a blank one and program it for whatever machine needed it getting it running the same day greatly improving customer service. If it wasn't the problem you were out of hours instead of days. In the early days this happened often. The early on board diagnostic [''sic''] were poor to no [''sic''] existent. The procedure in the manuals would sometimes say try this part and if that doesn't fix it try this one. This is referred to as swapnostics. Now when this system of programmable controllers was put into place the database was created inside the dealer portal so the only way to gain access to it was with a dealer log in to the corporate website. At the time there really was no customer portal in existence like there is today. Now could this database be incorporated into a customer accessible database? I don't know. I am not a software engineer. Considering the time, resources, money, failings, and aggravation involved with other systems that were incorporated I don't know if it would be worth the expense and manpower involved to do it for how very little it would be utilized by customers. In 25 years of doing this I can not think of one time I've had a customer that would be willing to even attempt to diagnose replace and reprogram their own controller. The risk of damaging a new controller, the investment in hardware and software, and the training and knowledge required to do it just isn't feasible. I don't think the process would be utilized enough to make it worth while. Also currently the software is free for the dealership to download and my dealership does not charge anything but our standard hourly service rate to install it. So a customer would have to program many controllers to ever see a return on investment. To continue on with the software issue in another scenario: when we make a major mechanical change to the machine we have to update the software. This would be like if you decided to change out the manual transmission in your car for an automatic. When this happens the dealership has to contact Deere to have new software created. This has to be done at the engineering level. Exactly how this process is done I'm not sure. But for a customer to have this level of access to software I would imagine it being similar to Microsoft giving you the uncompiled source code for office. Its [''sic''] just not going to happen. | ||
Another common complaint that is true is the lack of independent repair shops. To my knowledge there are no true legitimate businesses operating as independent repair shops in my area. This meaning they have some sort of store front, business cards, file taxes as a business, etc. Unlike cars where you have options besides the dealer like Pep Boys, Midas, Jiffy Lube, any thousands of other small independent repair shops this does not exist for agriculture. They like to blame this on the fact that these shops don't have access to the dealer level software. This is true but I'm not sure this is entirely the reason. This is because I was born in 1973 and grew up on a farm a decade before the first computer was put on a tractor and even then there were no independent repair shops for agriculture in my area. Or anywhere that I am aware of. Now maybe there is or was one somewhere but I feel like they have to be rare. I am very curious to find out if one does or did exists [''sic''] that is specialized in agriculture repair. If you got your farm machine repaired then or even now outside the dealership it was done so by a shadetree mechanic or a moonlighter. If you are not familiar with the terms a shade tree mechanic is someone who works out of their home typically with little to no formal education or training. Kind of like a hobbyist. A moonlighter is someone who works for a dealership during the day and works on their own time at night by the "moonlight" for cash. Now you might be able to get an automotive shop to do a simple repair like charge the air conditioning or a truck repair place to repair a hydraulic hose. But not many places outside the dealership have ever existed for major repair that I am aware of. This probably has a lot to do with demand. I would be surprised to find out there are not more Apple products in the state of New York than John Deere tractors with computers in the country. Not many people own a $300,000 tractor. Opening a tractor repair shop would be a very risky business even with availability to software. Availability to hardware is not an issue. Most of the tools we use are purchase [''sic''] from tool dealers like Snap-On, Matco, Mac, Craftsman, etc. The tools that are only | Another common complaint that is true is the lack of independent repair shops. To my knowledge there are no true legitimate businesses operating as independent repair shops in my area. This meaning they have some sort of store front, business cards, file taxes as a business, etc. Unlike cars where you have options besides the dealer like Pep Boys, Midas, Jiffy Lube, any thousands of other small independent repair shops this does not exist for agriculture. They like to blame this on the fact that these shops don't have access to the dealer level software. This is true but I'm not sure this is entirely the reason. This is because I was born in 1973 and grew up on a farm a decade before the first computer was put on a tractor and even then there were no independent repair shops for agriculture in my area. Or anywhere that I am aware of. Now maybe there is or was one somewhere but I feel like they have to be rare. I am very curious to find out if one does or did exists [''sic''] that is specialized in agriculture repair. If you got your farm machine repaired then or even now outside the dealership it was done so by a shadetree mechanic or a moonlighter. If you are not familiar with the terms a shade tree mechanic is someone who works out of their home typically with little to no formal education or training. Kind of like a hobbyist. A moonlighter is someone who works for a dealership during the day and works on their own time at night by the "moonlight" for cash. Now you might be able to get an automotive shop to do a simple repair like charge the air conditioning or a truck repair place to repair a hydraulic hose. But not many places outside the dealership have ever existed for major repair that I am aware of. This probably has a lot to do with demand. I would be surprised to find out there are not more Apple products in the state of New York than John Deere tractors with computers in the country. Not many people own a $300,000 tractor. Opening a tractor repair shop would be a very risky business even with availability to software. Availability to hardware is not an issue. Most of the tools we use are purchase [''sic''] from tool dealers like Snap-On, Matco, Mac, Craftsman, etc. The tools that are only available to dealers we are happy to sell to customers if they are willing to pay for it. We sell a specialized wrench used to change starters on old tractors all the time. In some circumstances we even borrow them out to customers. However if someone wanted to purchase the full line of specialty tools the dealership owns they would have to invest hundreds of thousands of dollars. This just isn't practical in most cases. So this isn't a problem I see changing because of right to repair since this issue is also caused by several other factors. Also the factory warranty for any component related to emissions is five years. So not many new tractors would even go to these shops for engine repair since the dealership will fix it for free. And just to be transparent and clear only the emission system is under warranty for 5 years. The rest of the machine is typically only covered for 1 or 2 years depending on the model. | ||