What is reverse engineering?

I'm not a legal expert, but I did engineering for over 20 years, and hold several patents.

Would it be "Reverse Engineering" if someone posted high resolution pictures taken of the electronic parts of products s/he owns to get online community help?

Would this be illegal?

Yes it would be reverse engeering, or a step in that direction. No it would not be illegal.

Reverse engineering refers to going from a physical device and using that to generate a design. Obviously, in normal "forward" engineering, the design is created before the physical device. There is nothing illegal about doing reverse engineering. However, designs may be covered by patent rights, and you can't legally use a patented design during the patent period no matter how you came up with that design, including reverse engineering. You can however buy something that is covered by one or more patents and use it however you want to, including any modifications you wish to make.

Based on the context in the "Open letter to Vetrix" thread, it seems like you just want to reverse engineer the design so that you can fix your Vectrix. There's nothing illegal about that since you bought the Vectrix. It will probably void the warrantee, but I'm sure you already know that. If you reverse engineered the design on something in which they hold a patent, you would be fine as long as you don't sell any new versions. If you just tweak something or modify their design there should be no legal issue with that. If you come up with a new design and then try to sell it to other Vectrix owners, you might have some infringement liability.

I hold a couple patents too... I just want to add a little bit.

Generally reverse engineering isn't illegal. Generally the companies whose widget you reverse engineer will not be friendly to you, as they will generally see that as a threatening act. I believe in some countries the laws differ. I believe the DMCA and other similar laws made it illegal to do some forms of reverse engineering.

FWIW: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Reverse_engineering

...Legality

In the United States and many other countries, even if an artifact or process is protected by trade secrets, reverse-engineering the artifact or process is often lawful as long as it is obtained legitimately. Patents, on the other hand, need a public disclosure of an invention, and therefore patented items do not necessarily have to be reverse engineered to be studied. One common motivation of reverse engineers is to determine whether a competitor's product contains patent infringements or copyright infringements.

Reverse engineering software or hardware systems which is done for the purposes of interoperability (for example, to support undocumented file formats or undocumented hardware peripherals), is mostly believed to be legal, though patent owners often contest this and attempt to stifle any reverse engineering of their products for any reason.

"...[W]here disassembly is the only way to gain access to the ideas and functional elements embodied in a copyrighted computer program and where there is a legitimate reason for seeking such access, disassembly is a fair use of the copyrighted work, as a matter of law."...

Generally reverse engineering isn't illegal. Generally the companies whose widget you reverse engineer will not be friendly to you, as they will generally see that as a threatening act. I believe in some countries the laws differ. I believe the DMCA and other similar laws made it illegal to do some forms of reverse engineering.

I agree that by reverse engineering something, it may not make you any friends within the company. The DMCA is for copyrights, so I don't see how that applies here. If you have any more specific references, it would bolster your point. As a patent owner yourself, you know it's really just a right to sue, and does not directly prevent anyone from using your design.

The DMCA is for copyrights, so I don't see how that applies here. If you have any more specific references, it would bolster your point.

I was hoping the wikipedia article would cover it. What I (half-)remember is anti-copyright advocates complaining that the DMCA makes it criminal/illegal to reverse engineer widgets that are meant to prevent copyright infringement. For example the people cracking DVD encryption do so by reverse engineering, and several of them have been put on trial.

But, yes, it's a right to sue.. and only if you discover that someone has infringed on your patent.

The DMCA doesn't apply here - but it is an interesting example of where they have made it illegal to reverse engineer the security algorithms associated with encrypting or watermarking copyrighted content.

The DMCA flies in the face of the generally held practices of reverse engineering being lawful if you obtained the target you wish to reverse engineer legally. So, one would be wise to tread cautiously when reverse engineering when a hostile company is involved because here is at least one example where a law impacts widely held rights.

I hate the DMCA but it is obvious that the reason they passed that section of the law was to dissuade people sharing things like the DeCSS algorithm (which is used to strip the CSS copy protection from DVDs). The people who cracked the CSS encryption are the folks David mentions that are on trial.

Mik - I doubt Vectrix would sue you but I'm not a lawyer and I don't always exhibit the best judgment!!!

Reverse engineering is when you buy a product, and then tear it apart to see how its made, and how it works. It is not illegal.

You can even copy the product for your own use. The question is, how much do you have to change a design before its a completely different product? Ford and Chevy both use round wheels and gasoline fuel in piston engines, but there are some patentable differences in the details.

My wife worked for a company that made a product, and a year later, Chinese copies began showing up. However, during the lawsuit it was proven that, legally, there were JUST enough differences that the court could only rule them as "similar", and they were not legally a patent infringement.

You can make changes to the Vectrix controller design (obviously "upgrades", instead of downgrades), but if you try to sell them to the public, that is when the lawyers get involved. The real question is, can you afford to "win" a long drawn-out legal battle?

If you make a better Vectrix controller quasi-copy, sell it as a 75% pre-assembled "kit", and make the 75% the hard part. The remaining 25% could just be soldering in the jumbo FET's and a couple other parts. I don't know why this matters, but it deflects lawsuits in the kit-plane and kit-car fields.

Best of luck, controllers are the weak link in most EV products.

If you make a better Vectrix controller quasi-copy, sell it as a 75% pre-assembled "kit", and make the 75% the hard part. The remaining 25% could just be soldering in the jumbo FET's and a couple other parts. I don't know why this matters, but it deflects lawsuits in the kit-plane and kit-car fields.

Kit planes and kit car manufacturers use kits to try to avoid product liability, not patent infrigement. If a vehicle has a problem and someone dies or gets hurt, the owner can sue the manufacturer. If it's a kit, the owner IS the manufacturer. If Mik makes Vectrix kits, it would not offer any patent protection, but might reduce his product liability. I doubt that Mik is interested in that though. Anyone buying one would loose their warranty coverage from Vectrix. I think he just wants a reliable electric motorcycle. Many people on this board end up doing a lot more heavy lifting than they thought they would . . .

I know there is a lot more wariness of "reverse engineering" among manufacturers than there used to. It wasn't that long ago that electronic products always came with a schematic - either in the manual or pasted in the cabinet.

Now, not only do you not get a schematic, but in the case of the e-max' controller, the numbers were individually scraped off of all the IC's on the board. A schematic sure would make modifying our controllers or chargers easier. And repairs are reduced to mostly guesswork.