Odometer Rollback Story..is there a way to determi

[Peter]

At the moment I feel rather discouraged about buying any newer used vehicle..I think most of us are very aware about mileage rollback or changed out speedos or even seen on youtube examples of people selling their digital skills on odometer manipulation…Is there a way to tell if the OD has been digitally rolled back??..this question has never entered my mind until last week while visiting a friend who has a 2 yr old Audi wanting to trade in…although overly kept up with oil changes etc and looking near new, the high mileage is somewhat negative and affects the bottom line for being a trade in…eventually the OD manipulator shows up and works his magic ( his only negative response was, “it takes a little longer to do because it is an Audi” )..I was more surprised and amazed, Not in the work he performed, but to the amount of phone calls he received for his service..5 calls received, all where from car dealers, 2 of them were new car dealers and 1 call about rolling back a high mileage frieghtline /sprinter..He acted like he was continually bragging and had nothing to hide…Is there a way to tell about the rollback digitally?

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[Flemming Jacobsen]

Often you can not trace the rollback in the cars electronics. We had a rather large scam concerning odometer rollbacks here and the only way they actually found out was because a car dealer bought ex-fleet cars with 200,000+ km on the Odometer and then rolled it back to say 80,000 and then sold the car as having only done 80,000.

The only way they actually found out was another car dealer doing service on the vehicle and wondering why the Diagnostics unit claiming it was a 200K+ Service when the car had only done 80K+.

Here in Denmark you “might” be able to track the rollback, by figuring out who the original seller/dealer was and enquire about the odometer before it was passed on if its a former fleet/leasing vehicle. OR by checking the cars Inspection history, because every time a car has to undergo the official inspection the odometer reading of the car is noted so if that starts fluctuating then something is very much amiss if the seller hasn’t informed you of it.

BUT here its technically not illegal to rollback the odometer if you had to do an Odometer change etc, BUT at the same time the law requires you to make that fact clear to whoever buys the car from you. So if you have a car thats done 250,000 KM, and you get a new Odometer for it that reads like 80,000 and you don’t want to bother with having it dialed forward then you are required by law to make any buyer of the car aware that the Odometer was changed at that and that time, and the reading on the new Odometer was 80K, and the old Odometer read 250K. Sad fact it, most if not all people never do inform any buyer of that fact, or the fact that the Odometer was dialled back.

Proving it actually happened is one thing, getting people charged for doing it and giving them a sentence is a completely second and different thing.

[twiggy]

When a car gets inspected in most places, the mileage is recorded and this shows up in every car fax report I have seen. So I don’t see how one would easily get away with rolling back the OD. But I wouldn’t buy a car without a verifiable carfax history.

[Peter]

[quote=”twiggy02919″ post=69955]When a car gets inspected in most places, the mileage is recorded and this shows up in every car fax report I have seen. So I don’t see how one would easily get away with rolling back the OD. But I wouldn’t buy a car without a verifiable carfax history.[/quote]. Carfax at most is Very superficial about the mechanical end of a vehicle and somewhat good in other areas like pointing out an accident or possible unpaid loan etc…. I am not sure what you mean by ” inspection ” but where I live, when getting your license plate sticker, odometer reading is always asked, but never verified… concerning the above example, I would be willing to bet that the true mileage/Kilo was never given and further complicated by only 2 dealer oil changes in the first year and no dealer visits in the 2nd yr…within this 2nd yr a lot of driving took place and the “roll back” as far I understand was put back near to the last time it was in the dealer.. .this vehicle is near flawless and who can tell the difference…Just reading about another auto manuf. with only 1 yr inspections or 10K/Mi oil changes to keep up the warranty (which ever comes first )…in other words you can do a lot of driving in any given year, then roll back the OD and all is new again…another story involves a mechanic who working for a new car dealer would not speak “ill” of his present employer, but only mentioned that the buyer (my friend) needs to beware of that particular vehicle he was looking at….several yrs pass before I see that same mechanic again working for another dealership …the word “beware” was said because the vehicle we were looking at was 3 yrs old, very low mileage, but the engine was replaced with one from the recycler with 3 times more then the original engine had and since it was considered only a part/repair replacement,..there was no reason legally to mention anything else…

[Peter]

Here is a different understanding about Carfax from the company itself @ http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gQdgIJkC2Tg

[twiggy]

Thanks for the video, it opened up my eyes.

[Jeff M.]

In this state,every vehicle that has obdII has to have info sent in to the DMV while getting a inspection. I’m pretty confident that anything older could have this done and not be traced unless records were kept on the car from prior sells…I can understand what your saying though,it is tough.

[Peter]

[quote=”daman2030″ post=73106]In this state,every vehicle that has obdII has to have info sent in to the DMV while getting a inspection. I’m pretty confident that anything older could have this done and not be traced unless records were kept on the car from prior sells…I can understand what your saying though,it is tough.[/quote]..Just guessing here, but I don’t think the actual travelled miles are recorded within the PCM for anybody to determine separately from the speedo…maybe it is your state’s way to find out if the check engine light is off rather then trust the inspector…

[Author]

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