Can digital odometer of used car be tampered with?

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  tonyjzx on 05/01/2015 - 17:05

  +1

  sure it is

  but look at it this way

  a Yaris is a cheap car, why would they waste time tampering with the odo a cheap car?

  how much money are you likely to make on it on a higher km vs a lower km one

  you still have to pay a guy to do it for you if you dont know, and if you dont know, you wont know a guy

  now an expensive car, or a high performance japanese turbo import, then it makes sense

  if the car is local and its a relatively inexpensive one, i wouldnt worry

  look for service records if you want to be extra careful

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  shadowarrior on 05/01/2015 - 17:55

  +4

  You will be surprised with the dealers :)
  I know of cases where dealers tampered with the digital speedometer to walk away from fixing a mechanical fault. Yes there's a query against said dealer now with Fairtrading :)

  A lot of private sellers also swap the cluster to get bit of resale value of their Japanese Imports if they can find a cheap low kms odo from another engine.

  Look for wear and tear of the seat and seatbelt to try and figure out the true age of a car. Ask for logbook service history. If there's no written service history, then all seller's words about 'yeah fixed the timing belt last week, mate's dad is a mechanic so he changed everything' is as correct as I am Batman.

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  p1 ama on 05/01/2015 - 18:10

  +1

  Hi friends, if a used car has the digital speedometer,(like the Yaris Toyota) not the clock with needles type,is it rare that the speedometer may be tampered with? Not so worried with reputable dealers selling used cars, as I think the punishment and risk is too high, but how easy is it for a private seller to tamper with, if it's electronic? It's made me worried about buying used car from private sale. Has anyone had bad experience with this with a used car that had the digital type?

  You can verify it with the service logbook, which will have the kms at each of the intervals written down, so you can at least verify it.

  The truth is, a Yaris is a pretty recent and cheap car, nobody will bother tampering with it because it's just not worth the cost, time and effort to do so.

  • 

    tonyjzx on 05/01/2015 - 18:19

    replacing just the cluster doesnt work on some late model cars

    lets just say thats not the only place the mileage is stored

    • 

      shadowarrior on 05/01/2015 - 18:28

      Late models, yep you will need to reflash the ECU, which then needs a piggyback to let you write on it, not a cheap solution. But if you have an old model Jap import like a FTO or Evo, changing the cluster and loom isn't that much hard work if you know what you are doing. :)

  • 

    Kevan2 on 05/01/2015 - 18:35

    +1

    However, if car is serviced via Toyota Dealers then they will have a digital log of services that may be picked up at any dealership service location. IE Sky Fleet insert local name Toyota.

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  momov3 on 05/01/2015 - 21:36

  +1

  Thanks very much for all the useful input and advice, I gather going by logbook service and km written will do as the service places cannot lie on that one. As for private sale, unless it has a logbook of service, I shall avoid.BTW Yaris was only used as an example in quoting the digital odometer. I am sure there are other cars with that same kind of odometer, but I could only think Yaris!

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  Mumbles on 05/01/2015 - 23:48

  Almost all digital car and motorcycle odometers can be altered.

  Search on eBay for "odometer correction" (or similar words) and you'll find how common the services are:

  The hardware is really simple. The kilometre figure is just a saved number on a memory chip. Might be as simple as off the shelf hobbyist technology such as an EEPROM programmer to reprogram most industry standard memory chips.

  I agree with the previous commenters. Its unlikely an owner of a cheap, low margin used car (eg. Yaris) will go to the trouble to disassemble the dash, send off the odometer, wait a month for postage (to and from) to haggle an extra $1000 on low milage.

  Be very worried buying expensive, high margin used cars (eg. Audi TT, Japanese grey imports, …). The difference in high milage and low milage prices make it very attractive to tamper with the digital odometer.