It's a long story but here goes:
I have a old 78' cad, Seville.that runs sweet.a car that's in nice shape , all original.well,after having high emissions on a smog test.after stopping my local gm/cadillac dealer they told me that "there wern't any tech there that could work on anything this old".so off i went. and i took my car to a local shop. and asked if they would find the source of my problem.after being told how one employee had been around these cars for years and "knew them well" i decided to let them repair it[sm=badidea.gif] a day later i stopped by to drop off a Cadillac repair manual. to my surprise there was another Cadillac in the shop like mine with a for sale sign for $2500 parked next to it with the hood up ...( you thinking what I'm thinking.....hold on it gets better/worse) and i was told it's the owners car and "we switched the sensors and found yours is bad and when we put his in your car your emissions went way down!" OK looks a little suspect but hey they found the problem.even though they trying to charge me $120 for a $70.00 part. I'm thinking "OK replace it" and I'm done.two days go buy i haven't heard from them call back they tell me "it won't start every thing points to your alarm thats causing this"(now the owners working on my car) i say OK disconnect it i'l get that fixed. another few days go buy i drop in on them. i get there the owners no where to be found and my distributer is sitting on the work bench and the tech that was originally working on it says (the good news)"this part just some how blew out...it happens"....and shows me a electrical part on the side of the distributor(OK now the bad news) he broke the distributor housing taking it out! finally talked to the owner who tells me he will take care of it and they have ordered another one and will put it in. (now I'm starting to get excited)and after i had to call them again 2 days later i was told "we cant get the emissions down." .so i call Friday and was told hurrah hurrah we found the problem it's the computer."we switched computers with the the other seville and the emissions went way down and your car runs great". so we sent yours out to be repaired.repaired? well as calmly as i could i reminded him that "you told me that before and that it was running "great" when i brought it to you"
my question is:
i thought these could only be replaced. can a computer they be"sent out" and repaired? i'm thinking now he's just trying to recoup the price of the distributor, thanks. Byron

 

Hey Byron: There are places that recondition electronic components like ECM's. I have a 1981 Brougham and was having problems with the car running rich and out of timing, so I went down to the parts place and got a recondtioned ECM that was sitting on the shelf and it cost me $163.00. Took it home and plugged it in and it took care of the gremlins. Why would they send yours out to be fixed and have your car tied up when they could have put in a recon?????Go figure. Hope that this episode works out o.k. for you in the end. It sounds a little suspect on the mechanics part alright. Chow.

 

thanks brougham for the info.
after reading your post decided to do a search found some folks on the east cost that wants $150 and change to recon it. yea there suspect alright. i went down there first thing monday morning. and the service manager was wrong it wasn't sent out the owner said that they found a rec. one for 500.00 plus 150.00 to put it in.[:@] well ..let me think about it .............NO! so i jsut told him to put it back together and i would come get it. driven in and towed out ! and charged 272.00 that's one hell of deal. thanks again,Byron