Livewire Automotive Diagnostics and Repair

Livewire Automotive Diagnostics and Repair General repair and advanced electrical diagnostics for gas and light duty diesel vehicles. Reasonable rates! call to book an appointment! (715)966-1129

Alright I have been meaning to post this one for a bit and this absolutely blows my mind! I am not one for publicly sham...
08/11/2026

Alright I have been meaning to post this one for a bit and this absolutely blows my mind! I am not one for publicly shaming other shops so I will not mention the other shop involved in this situation. So to make a long story as short as possible, the customer went to "other" shop with a complaint of vibration at 50 mph and over. They had the vehicle for 2 months the first time and threw charges at her left and right and finally let the vehicle go to her. She brought the vehicle back to them because the issue was not resolved despite the huge bill. They took the vehicle and had it for another month and ran a full tank of gas on it trying to figure out the problem. In the end they quoted her over $3,000 for a new rear differential. The customer wanted a second opinion and brought it to me. A quick scan showed a fault in the differential control module stating "invalid data received from ABS module". Now this might have been where they stopped and figured it must be the differential since they couldn't find any other issues. I went ahead and saw the abs control module had two codes one for the left front wheel speed sensor and one for the right rear wheel speed sensor. Testing showed these sensors to be bad so they were replaced and the abs light turned off along with all codes from differential control module and abs module. Now on to the vibration. I lifted the vehicle up and gave each wheel a shake and found the right rear wheel had an extreme amount of play as well as coupling on the inside of the tire and wires exposed on the tire. A quick inspection underneath and i found the outboard bushing for the right rear lower forward lateral arm was completely missing. This entire process took not even an hour to diagnose so I have no clue how this could have happened with such a big reputable shop. Pick your mechanic wisely!

Havnt posted for a while but never a shortage of fun issues to find. Here is one i had a bit ago:Customer called about a...
08/11/2026

Havnt posted for a while but never a shortage of fun issues to find. Here is one i had a bit ago:

Customer called about a no crank no start condition. They replaced the battery and the starter. I put a scanner on it and there were over 30 fault codes and no communication with the PCM. Checked powers and grounds at the pcm and found no voltage at one of the voltage feed wires to the pcm.. traced the circuit for that power feed back to the fuse block. Circuit testing showed me there was a broken wire inside of the fuse box so i took it apart to find mouse damage. Repaired the wires, vehicle starts and no codes came back. Being right the first time can save a lot of money in the end.. here is a picture of the wire damage if you look closely.

06/04/2026

Decided to keep the doors open for business.. Calls started flowing again and people seem to like what I do. My family wants me to keep the doors open as well and honestly so do I because I love what I do and all of my customers have been awesome! With that being said.. book an appointment today! 715-966-1129

Customer complaint of misfire that won't go away, Coils and plugs have been replaced and before they went any further wi...
01/30/2026

Customer complaint of misfire that won't go away, Coils and plugs have been replaced and before they went any further with injectors they wanted a diagnosis. Scan data showed codes have been deleted and no misfire counts or codes coming up to help identify which cylinder(s) are misfiring. Next choice of action was a power balance test and that showed a steady misfire on cylinder 5.. next i moved to a quick relative compression test with a cylinder sync back probed into cylinder 5 ignition coil command and an amp clamp around battery negative cable, disable fuel and crank for ten seconds.. scope showed steady low compression on cylinder 5 and i could hear it in the crank rhythm. Next decided to go old school and use the compression tester on cylinder 5 for a wet and dry compression test. Dry showed 73 psi max and wet showed 138 psi max confirming bad piston rings on cylinder 5 most likely due to a misfire previously left unchecked for too long.. no coil, plug, or injector will help this misfire unfortunately. Picture shows relative compression test on lab scope, yellow is cranking amperage and blue is cylinder 5 ignition command.

Customer came in with a complaint of no heat blowing in the vehicle.. noticed a check engine light flashing and a scan s...
01/27/2026

Customer came in with a complaint of no heat blowing in the vehicle.. noticed a check engine light flashing and a scan showed a cylinder 1 misfire code. Diagnostics lead to a failed head gasket leaking coolant into cylinder 1 along with a low coolant condition.. misfire and heating issue both caused by a blown head gasket. Picture inside of cylinder 1 dripping coolant.

2014 Honda CRV. Throwing sensors at cam or crank sensor codes or or taking the time to remove the timing cover without k...
10/30/2025

2014 Honda CRV. Throwing sensors at cam or crank sensor codes or or taking the time to remove the timing cover without knowing for sure if it should be removed is a waste of time and money. Back probed into the cam and crank signals on the pcm and I know what steps to take after i analyze the waveform.. This one shows timing is absolutely off and that there was massive slack in the chain. After analysis of these waveforms, it makes perfect sense and is totally justifiable to go into the timing cover and NOT just put new sensors in it. You can see in the picture that the timing chain is not even fully seated on the teeth.

2016 Ford Explorer with a p0016 code. Here is the set up and results. This test was done with the VVT disabled to get a ...
09/29/2025

2016 Ford Explorer with a p0016 code. Here is the set up and results. This test was done with the VVT disabled to get a base timing waveform. The results show good cam and crank sensor function, unfortunately the timing is off by one tooth with slack in the timing chain.

A very interesting endeavor on a Subaru Impreza STI with VVT solenoid codes. Checking cam and crank signals to check bas...
09/18/2025

A very interesting endeavor on a Subaru Impreza STI with VVT solenoid codes. Checking cam and crank signals to check base timing and to see if the vvt is working and moving the cams like it should.
Blue: left cam signal
Yellow: right cam signal
Purple: crank signal
Green: OCV solenoid command signal

Fuel injector Voltage and amperage waveform showing proper voltage and amperage as well as a proper opening and closing ...
08/03/2025

Fuel injector Voltage and amperage waveform showing proper voltage and amperage as well as a proper opening and closing of the injector pintle.

Address

612 C**n Street
Rhinelander, WI
54501

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Monday 8:30am - 6pm
Tuesday 8:30am - 6pm
Wednesday 8:30am - 6pm
Thursday 8:30am - 6pm
Friday 8:30am - 6pm
Saturday 8:30am - 6pm
Sunday 9am - 3pm

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+17159661129

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