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I built my mechanic friend a car diagnostic app that talks to the AI

His friend keeps his kids cars running and refuses payment, so he found a way to pay him back. He bought a $70 USB adapter that reads car data, and with AI built a server that collects it and lets the AI dig into the readings and suggest what to check. He has tested it on his own 2024 Honda and his friends 2003 GMC truck.

How it works

  1. Buy a USB OBD-II adapter for about $70
  2. Paste a post describing the idea into AI
  3. Build a server that collects the car data
  4. Connect it to the AI as a tool it can query
  5. Test on his own car and his friends truck

Why it’s worth knowing

The debugging partner is the car itself: the app feeds the cars own readings to the AI instead of a person guessing from a warning light.

Where it’s from

Summarized from a public post on reddit.com. See the original ↗

Upgraded prompt

A ready-to-use prompt for this idea, built from research on what makes AI agents do the job right: who the AI should be, the exact steps, and a check to make sure it was done the way you wanted.

1Who the AI should be
2The prompt, with the steps
3The check when it’s done
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Every idea is a real post from someone who tried it, summarized in our words, with a link to the original. App names are swapped for plain words.