This is an awesome board for embedded development. Not as powerful or I/O rich as the Beaglebone Black, but add $6 worth of CAN transceiver chips and a 12V->5V switching power supply and you've got an incredibly powerful automotive compute unit. The Pi 1 was a bit underpowered for what I'm doing, and this might hit the sweet spot while dropping $35 off my unit cost for small quantities. None of the issues you mention affect that calculation at all.
That's exactly what I'm going to use this for, too. Right now I have an original Pi B logging GPS and OBD data, but it's crammed into a small storage spot in the car and is a big waste of space. I'm super excited to be able to cut my project to less than half its original size. I don't need ethernet (other than for debugging), four usb ports, etc. etc. I think this is going to be fantastic for creating homemade embedded devices.
I don't right now, unfortunately, but a writeup is next on my list of projects after the carputer is complete. I'll post it here if there's interest. For learning about the OBD protocol, though, these resources have been very helpful:
Who uses ethernet anymore?