ChatGPT For Gearheads & Automotive Enthusiasts - It Will Blow Your Mind!
I have to admit, given my old school nature, I never thought I would be writing an article discussing artificial intelligence and how it can benefit the “Do It Yourself” automotive enthusiast; but here we are…
HOW IT STARTED
I was recently faced with an electronic conundrum on a set of Zada Tech digital screens I was installing to monitor my left & right air fuel ratios, intake air temp, coolant temp, oil pressure, and fuel pressure. The screens would freeze the minute I turned the key to start the car. My first thought was that the screens were extra sensitive to the voltage drop during the starting procedure and the way I could rectify this issue was by introducing a small capacitor. I had a very basic understanding of capacitors from my old school 90’s stereo days when we would spend all of our hard earned money on subwoofers and amplifiers to try and blow our eardrums out during a Friday night cruise!
Not knowing who I could ask my basic capacitor questions to regarding my self diagnosed voltage drop issue, I decided to throw caution to the wind and give this ChatGPT thing everyone has been talking about lately a go. Now I’ll be honest, I went into this with very low expectations - especially given the fact that this is a very specific automotive electrical issue - however to my surprise, it was like I was talking to an old school shop teacher that was a mechanic back when Christ was a cowboy!
Link to my Youtube video on this topic below:
Long story short, my capacitor fix did not work however, I am of the impression that it wasn’t because of the information that ChatGPT provided me with, it was because my problem runs deeper then a simple voltage drop and is most likely magnetic interference of some sort.
ROUND 2
A few weeks later, I found myself researching another project to try and solve my coolant temp issues I am having in my 1992 Kenne Bell blown Foxbody notchback 5.0. My car currently has an aftermarket set of Contour electric fans installed but they really don’t seem to be able to keep up in my particular configuration. For that reason, I have decided to make a switch to dual 12” Spal electric “paddle style” fans of which will be mounted to a sealed aluminum fan shroud. These will be mounted behind a 3 core Mishimoto radiator, and in front of that is a one core Vintage Air A/C condenser. I know a few people with this type of 12” Spal fan set up and they all speak very highly of it. I also know a lot of people that use the Contour fan set up and they too are very happy with it. Considering all of this - While in the middle of online shopping for my future Spal fans - I decided to head back over to ChatGPT to see what it thinks of my electric fan predicament.
I started by asking it what it knew about the 12” Spal fans I was considering buying and I specifically used the Spal part number to reference the exact fans I was asking it about. Its response was ridiculously thorough and even provided me with various applications that this specific fan is used for in various industries and automotive applications.
I then went on tell it that I had a Mishimoto 3 core radiator, and a one core A/C condenser, and also told it some details about my car (year, make, model, etc.), I then asked it how these Spal fans would perform when mounted to this radiator/condenser set up in my specific car and yet again, the details and advice it provided were very in-depth.
At this point I then started to ask ChatGPT about the theoretical static pressures specific to my radiator & condenser combination, but these questions were more difficult for it to answer as there is not a lot of information on the web surrounding this topic. ChatGPT did however find some static pressure data on other 3 core radiator/condenser combinations to which it provided me with those figures as hypothetical data to consider.
*For reference: Static pressure is a fairly technical measurement that I am in no way qualified to explain in any sort of of intelligent manner however, but for the purposes of this video, think of static pressure as the limitation of air flow through a restricted space. In a very crude example: A one core radiator is going to have a lower static pressure than a 3 core radiator. Put another way, as static pressure increases, air flow decreases which means the actual CFM capabilities of an electric fan decrease from its advertised rating which is typically calculated with zero static pressure.
Following all of this, I asked it to compare the dual 12” Spal fan set up to that of the dual contour fan setup and this is where the information started to get slightly skewed… ChatGPT did a great job providing the pros and cons of each electric fan set up - it even provided me with amperage draw information, wiring recommendations, and summed the information by actually telling me that the contour fan setup was a more favourable option then that of the dual Spal fan setup!?
This is the part of the story where I want to share with you my thoughts on where/when & how I think ChatGPT can be slightly dangerous.
Problem #1. From personal experience, I know what the aftermarket contour fan set up is capable of; and I also know that it is claimed that the OEM contour fans are far superior (to which I agree with) to that of the aftermarket units available for sale today. Now ChatGPT will show you the sources that it is pulling the information from that it is providing you with, and when I checked its references, much of the information it was providing me with was in reference to the OEM style contour fan setups.
Problem #2. ChatGPT could not find any data relating to how the contour fans CFM rating decreases as static pressure increases. Armed with some knowledge of my own, I know that the Ford contours that these fans come out of utilize a fairly small - probably one core or so - radiator i.e. “lower static pressure.” Given that, I feel its safe to assume that the engineers at ford would have most definitely taken this (plus way more) into consideration when designing and building the 95-2000 contour which leads me to believe that the electric fan set up they chose was probably not picked for its ability to overcome static pressure - at least not to the extent that we in the mustang world are wanting it to with our 3 core rads, condensers, intercoolers, etc.
So what’s the take away from all of this? Had I not entered into that conversation with ChatGPT knowing the information I did - or at least been slightly critical of the information it was providing me with, It would have taken me down a path of purchasing the aftermarket contour fans as the superior set up for my application. Further to all of this, I’ve already tried the aftermarket contour fans in my car, and they are obviously not up to the task
Moral of the story:
ChatGPT can be a very effective tool for obtaining high level information you are searching for. An good analogy I’ve come up with for where I think ChatGPT is the most effective is: Remember what it was like in the early 2000’s when you would log into the mustang or other vehicle specific forums to try and solve a problem you were faced with? We’d spend hours searching through 88 pages of forum posts until you found that one thread that saved the day. ChatGPT can save you all those hours of reading and scrolling through thousands of forum threads and provide you with the specific information you are looking for in a matter of seconds!
However, ChatGPT much like the forums suffer for the same shortcoming: both can very easily provide you with terrible information if you are not armed with a critical mind and/or have some basic understanding of the topics you are searching.