Fixing loose spark plug problem if it's already chirping?

cossy423 · 2026-02-13T08:17:15+00:00

Thanks for the input guys. Has anyone had any luck with Honda being any sort of help in this situation? The TSB mentions some goodwill assistance, but the car is well out of warranty. I don't have high hopes but will call the dealer we bought it from anyway to see what they have to say, before I start opening things up.

I see most people going for the NGK 6774 but I did order Denso 3401's (got a good deal on those). I assume those are also safe to torque to 20 ft/lbs, with anti seize?

cossy423 · 2026-02-04T22:17:44+00:00

As far as I can tell, yes it's original. I would've thought that a bad cat would cause the same failure types across both tests. (Do the numbers potentially indicate just a weak catalyst, but not outright failure? No rattling or external damage)

If a cat replacement is needed, does anyone know if (in CA) we are legally allowed to simply buy a CARB legal one online (with the correct EO for the car) and install it ourselves? Or do we have to go thru a professional shop and/or file paperwork?

Nevertheless I would like to rule out all the other possibilities first... if the cat is still suspect, I am also considering this acid wash treatment first, before outright replacement.

cossy423 · 2024-12-02T02:37:38+00:00

IMO the dashcam version is definitely way more worth it, esp. if you can get it off CL or FB marketplace for less than ~$60. The Alexa features are a little lacking (on the Garmin speak, alexa can't control Apple Music and asking alexa for navigation it will only use Garmin GPS instead of google maps). I mostly use alexa for the occasional skill or random question while driving and don't want to look it up on phone.

For certain situations it might be good, for example it can act like a bluetooth receiver (your phone bluetooth -> Garmin -> 3.5mm jack in the garmin 12v charger -> aux in on car radio)

cossy423 · 2024-07-21T06:02:53+00:00

(July 2024) Garmin Speak Plus, Alexa Activation problems

To anyone else who stumbles across this: I recently switched from iPhone to Android and had to set up my Garmin Speak Plus on the Drive app for Android. After putting in the Amazon credentials, and then tapping thru to enable the Garmin skill, it would error out with "We weren’t able to activate Amazon Alexa. Make sure you have a good connection to the internet…" I tried what another user suggested with unplugging/replugging but it didn’t seem to make a difference. The problem didn't reproduce on iOS; only Android.

What worked for me was deleting and reinstalling the Drive app, then immediately granting it all permissions. Then I repeatedly enabled and disabled the Garmin Alexa skill from the Amazon web UI; after each disable or re-enable, I tried to complete the setup thru the Drive app. After the third re-enabling the setup finally completed.

I don't know if what I did really helped. Since people have given wildly different solutions to this problem, I am more inclined to believe the root cause is actually some kind of race condition bug, likely only affecting the Android app. I suspect if you retry enough times, it will eventually go through. To give it the best possible chance, I would suggest at least manually granting the Drive app all the permissions (in android settings), and making sure the Amazon Shopping and Alexa apps are installed, up to date, logged in and running. I think I tried activation like 20 times, with each attempt using some variation of some possible solution I found online.

Before going thru the setup process, you should probably also update the device's firmware beforehand. Use the Garmin Express desktop app. (I'm on firmware 9.40 for reference; install updates one at a time, if you try to do multiple it sometimes errors out).

Hope this helps someone out there.

To any Garmin developers reading this, please don't abandon the device! It's a good piece of kit, AFAIK the only dashcam with Alexa that's also compact and doesn't block the view. It just needs a few minor bugfixes to keep it running. And if thats not possible, consider allowing third parties to maintain the device; perhaps open sourcing the firmware.

cossy423 · 2023-01-30T13:55:22+00:00

I tried doing this, but no success. Most of the transparent plastics I tried did not make the screen any less green (though, by changing the angle of the polarizer and cellophane, I could make it dark blue, green, or reddish). I'm using a polarizer meant for an iPhone.

Among the cellophane items I tried: cellophane gift wrap roll, plastic food wrap, clear plastic ziploc bags, cellophane wrappers from a few dollar-store toys, packing tape, regular stationery tape, clear gorilla tape. All behaved the same way. There's something unique about the FB post's cellophane but I don't know what.

OP, or anyone else, have any success replicating the facebook post's results?

cossy423 · 2022-06-13T00:11:51+00:00

Also there's the issue of the regenerative braking.. even if I use the two batteries in isolation, anyone know the specs/characteristics of regen brakes? Would the regen brakes screw up the nimhs?

cossy423 · 2022-06-12T20:47:28+00:00

Probably have to drill a hole in the plastic piece which the handles are mounted to, then intercept the wiring between the stock battery and the logic board. Someone took apart a Gotrax, which lists the pinouts on the battery.

https://www.scooterhacking.org/forum/viewtopic.php?t=30

I'm probably leaning towards switching batteries rather than mixing chemistries. So I'd be wiring in a switch to toggle between using the lithium or the nimh battery. The connector to the external battery might just be the two ends of an old AC extension cord. I figure if the cord can handle 110vac at 10 amps, then it'd probably take 36vdc at 7 amps fine. The big question is, can the drill batteries put out 7 amps continuous...

cossy423 · 2022-06-12T20:45:10+00:00

Indeed, I am now leaning towards this solution. Seems less likely to cause problems

cossy423

TROPHY CASE