Patent ID: 8370020

Claim:
A vehicle comprising: a vehicle bus; a plurality of sensors for monitoring the operational status or condition of components of the vehicle, each sensor generating a sensor signal indicative of the monitored vehicle component and providing the sensor signal to the vehicle bus; a diagnostics module connected to the vehicle bus to receive the sensor signals, wherein the diagnostics module generates diagnostic data of the vehicle based on the sensor signals; and a hands-free phone system having a communications module connected to the vehicle bus and operable for wirelessly communicating voice signals and the diagnostic data over a Bluetooth wireless path with a Bluetooth enabled cell phone in the vehicle using Bluetooth communications; wherein during a call between a user using the cell phone and another party over a phone network, the communications module receives voice signals of the user via a microphone connected to the communications module and wirelessly transmits the voice signals of the user over the wireless path to the cell phone for transmission over the phone network for receipt by the other party and the communications module wirelessly receives voice signals of the other party over the wireless path from the cell phone and outputs the voice signals of the other party through speakers connected to the communications module for the user to hear; wherein the diagnostics module transfers the diagnostic data to the communications module and the communications module wirelessly transmits the diagnostic data over the Bluetooth wireless path to the cell phone using Bluetooth communications for the cell phone to communicate the diagnostic data to an external destination.