O2 sensor bias/ a/f curves

Greg Hermann bearbvd at sni.net
Fri Aug 28 16:02:09 GMT 1998


>>
>Here is the story on NTK sensors: NTK/NGK sold the air/fuel marketing
>rights to Horiba here in Ann Arbor. They mark the price WAY UP for
>even the cheapest model. If you are using for microproc control like
>some latest DFI and the excellent FelPro, THEN you can get from NTK
>directly if you SIGN a legal agreemeent. Price from a quote I got
>are: Interface box-$400, Sensor-$600, harness-$60.
>
>A number of vendors have thougt about builing a cheap NGK 5 wire
>a/f meter, BUT Horiba lawyers are very aggresive in protecting their
>profit margins. It is pretty dumb. They could license to one of the
>vendors and make money on that without really affecting their sales to
>companies like Ford etc.

All---

To me this stinks. A horriba situation, as it were.

I got a quote from NTK of more like $600 for the whole ball of wax, along
with an agreement to sign agreeing to no resale and to use only on an
onboard vehicle engine management system, as well as specifically no
exhaust analyzer equipment use.

Was it Clare?? who said yesterday that you can get the sensors from Honda
for $300?? If so, what part # and for what car or cars??? If Honda dealers
are  selling them for $300, you can bet that there is a plant somewhere
making the sensors in which someone would feel they were robbing you (but
would be willing to get their idea of richer) by selling the same sensors
out the back door to someone for $50 or less. Any detectives out there, in
the right part of the world?

For example, I can remember buying Boge made rubber pivot bushings for a
Volvo front suspension (which US Volvo dealers sold for about $35 each) for
less than $5 from a guy who was making money at it,and not doing any
stealin or receiving any stolen goods!! No racial (or politically
incorrect) generalizations intended here, but I think that Asian people
invented these kind of commercial games a millenium or so before the
Europeans even began to play them. I can also remember working for an
outfit that sold Vega timing belts to Chevy for $2.80 (Chevy dealers sold
them fo about $37.50).

As far as the NTK "black box", the operating descriptions from NTK indicate
that it has to have some digital insides, but hey, don't we have a few
hackers on list?? I would bet that once the box were reverse engineered
(who us?) that hardware cost would not exceed $40 or so.

To quote something that the (then) Dean Emeritus of Cornell's Engineering
School said to me in a private moment about 25 years ago, "Lawyers are
nothing but a parasite on the face of progress!" In the years since, I
think that they have mutated to where they have even BETTER holding power
than a crab. And I mean a crotch cricket, not the kind you eat!

To me this is a situation where someone has invested money retentively in
order to profit (more) by keeping a product less productive than it would
otherwise be for the economy, the environment, and society (and us). If the
law can't (or won't) correct such situations, I believe that those of us
who can, should! How about it, guys and girls?? Are we all hackers at heart
or not??

Regards, Greg





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