J2534 Programming Conductor plates on ME 9.7 7 speed transmissions Key Off Key On very important!

When programming these plates its best practice to have the old plate in hand if you can not enter in the flow rate data for the valve body manually. 

I ran into a vehicle where I had to program a new plate. The tech had the old plate in hand but had the new plate installed already. Normally Xentry needs to be able to read the old plate to transfer it to the new plate if not then you would need to enter the flow rate data for the valve body manually. So I asked the tech to install the old plate for programming.

As I went to program the Xentry (Mercedes software) was telling me that the new plate was already programmed and could not be programmed after the plate was swapped out. I then called the technician explained the situation and he stated he did not turn the key off during the swap out of the plates. 

I then asked him to uninstall the new plate and make sure during swap out to turn the key off and then on after the new plate was installed. I went through the process again after the swap out again and the programming of the new plate went through successfully.

Now the reason I’m submitting this is because if a new tech learning to program a new plate for the first time and received this message. Then that tech would assume that the control unit was already programmed and would be calling the parts department for a new plate, because the tech did not have knowledge or didn’t know the keys needs to be cycled during swapping out of the plates. 

Knowing this would save you a lot of time and head ache. When I first started programming these plates. I myself fell into this trap. Programming can be very frustrating and confusing at times and the simplest detail can be over looked almost all the time. So when swapping out control units always remember to turn the key off and then back on after the new controller has been installed. This will save a lot of time and headaches. I hope to all the new beginners programming with J2534 this information helps you out.