CEL, Puddles and 5 minutes - need help

[Terry DeBord]

I've got a strange situation - 2007 ST 4X4 V6 XLT 132,000 miles. I've had twice now that when going through a puddle - not a big one either - the engine shortly after will go into limp along mode and eventually die. Wrench flashes, CEL comes on and my cheap scan tool gives me all kinds of TPS type codes. I wasn't thinking this last time and cleared them before I saved them off. I'll pull off the road, sit 5 minutes and then it starts up fine, Wrench is gone but CEL on till I cleared it. During the 5 minutes, tried to restart and it would but the rough idle, no power and I don't think I could get RPMs over like 1500 - 2000. After that it shows no sign of any issues and runs great as normal so I'm thinking it's just a matter of something that gets wet and then drys off and is fine. The puzzling thing to me is the TPS sensor alarms and then gray PCM codes. I don't get any other type of sensor issues like O2. I few months back I really did have a Throttle position issue and replaced the full thottle body/acel pump and TPS sensor as a unit and no issues from that - only the codes I'm getting now are almost the same as I remember. So far nothing on bottom end gives and codes, it's like top engine stuff but the puddles are only like 3-5 inches deep and not hitting them at high speeds so it's not like water splashing up all over the engine.

 

[Tike]

read this thread might help
Found my ghosts in the machine
if you replace tps use the ford updated design. do not use aftermarket on this part.

 

[Terry DeBord]

Breakthrough!!!! I think I figured it out or very close. I have to admit though my own stupidity in a way. I work for a command center for a very large IT organization and my job is all about data - millions of bits of data every 5 minutes...I didn't trust the data my truck was telling me. I thought my own observations were more true than the truck data. Yeah, not so much. Yesterday was a good raining day and as luck would have it my truck started the bad stuff on the freeway - luckily I was able to limp off the freeway and get to city streets. Over the next half hour I did about 6 or more cycles, half a block at a time, truck acts up - I read codes - I save off the codes, I clear the codes and on I go for another half block. I finally sat for a few minutes and looked at the freeze frame data and the codes - The first code every time was a P0122 = Throttle Position sensor based code. Why would that be, ran through a puddle or in this case good and raining and that is on the top of the engine? So I flipped up the hood, felt around by the TPS, not wet, fingered the wires a bit - push in the plug and got back in. Started the truck and proceeded to drive home (another 8 miles) like nothing ever happened. Drove to work today since I didn't have time last night in the pouring rain to look at it but today is sunny. tonight or this weekend I'll have to look closely at the wiring. My only theory is that the water up on the passenger side exhaust manifold caused steam to rise up and then create the condition for a short of some sort. It has never acted up when dry out

 

[Tike]

nice work, i would still check all your harness'. mine had no visible damage ( tps ) but i decided to try to insulate them and it turns out the wires were melted together and contacting on the inside which was not visible. some liquid wire shielding some high temp electrical tape and new plastic corrugated tube fixed it for me.

 

[Terry DeBord]

thanks for the ideas

 

[Terry DeBord]

Here is the problem...can you spot it...ha

 

[bdmaash]

someone decided to cut off insulation from wires for testing and forgot to re-insulate them?

 

[ptf18]

And your fix will be??? IMHO...if you could extract the wire from the connector (lord knows what extraction tool you'd need) apply some shink tube around the bare spots and reinsert the wire.

Keep us posted. Just love half *(&^% work

 

[Mr. Alligator]

someone decided to cut off insulation from wires for testing and forgot to re-insulate them?

Very careful rats?

 

[bdmaash]

wonder which color tasted the best


as far as fixing - the heatshrink tubing is the best/only suggestion - gluefit heatshrink would seal out environment to a point

extraction - the red thing needs to come off first, then an extraction tool can be used.
I would suggest grabbing a connector from a cheap wrecker to practice on first
or you could say what is my time worth and run it till it dies with some electrical tape

 

[Tike]

Here is the problem...can you spot it...ha View attachment 171246

told ya! hahah glad u found it man!