01 Sport Trac LOTS of weird issues

[rusty93xlt]

Just bought an 01 Sport Trac with 110,000 miles and I'm having LOTS of really crazy issues with it so much so that I don't even know where to start. The car has a LOT of of aftermarket parts on it including a Prestige alarm that has been a royal PITA.

Transmission:

The transmission will not engage OD. OD off button works but nothing seems to be happening. Doesn't downshift when you floor it at 40mph, just stays in whatever gear it's in.

At 2000 RPM's with the engine under load there is an odd noise that sounds similar to an ABS module engaging.

The transmission slips after it's been run a few hours then sits for a little while. The OD light will flash non-stop and the OD off button has no effect. While this is happening it will move forwards in NEUTRAL REVERSE and PARK but in park it'll only lurch a bit because it's in park. Sometimes in REVERSE it's like it's trying to go forwards and backwards at the same time. If it's been sitting over night this doesn't happen.

The 4WD doesn't do anything, no lights on the dash and no 4WD HI or LO.

There is a beefy Uhaul hitch so they definitely towed something with it at some point.

When you shift into or out of park the radio resets and goes into demonstration mode which flashes red to blue 150X a second and looks like a state trooper in the dashboard. It's an aftermarket Pioneer that appears to be high end and has a moderate size amplifier under the back seat.

Alarm:

It's got a Prestige alarm and remote starter with a kill switch up under the dash. Figured out that there's a special sequence that needs to happen to get in the car and the alarm was giving me so many issues that I cut the wire to the siren to shut it up. If you step away for more than 5 seconds, you get locked out.

Lights:
Aftermarket HID lights but when you try to put the hi beams on the headlights go out.

Cruise control doesn't work either. It has had the 2006 era inline fuse recall performed.

There is a bunch of cheap aftermarket stuff installed like a MAF performance tuner, fuel line magnets and a bunch of other stuff I'm still trying to figure out that's been cheaply spliced into the factory wiring harness.

Bought this this at a dealership and it's turned into the demon car from hell. Please help!

 

[just1me]

What did you pay for it? Seems like the dealer would have dealt with those issues while it was on the lot. If it was me, I would look at the factory wiring diagram, and remove that aftermarket alarm and stuff, and start with a clean slate, then address any issues from there.

 

[rusty93xlt]

Paid $2900. It didn't start acting up until AFTER we left the dealer.

 

[just1me]

$2900 isn't bad, I never can seem to find those deals everyone else finds. If your good with wiring diagrams I know a couple sites you can get the diagrams for your truck to help you problem solve the issues.

 

[rusty93xlt]

$2900 isn't bad, I never can seem to find those deals everyone else finds. If your good with wiring diagrams I know a couple sites you can get the diagrams for your truck to help you problem solve the issues.

It took awhile to find this one and I had to jump on it pretty fast and had to drive 2 states away to get it. The last 3 I've gone to look at sold out from under me before I even laid eyes on them.

 

[just1me]

Yeah the Sport Trac is a pretty popular truck it seems, got any pics of your ST?

 

[01STrunner]

I bet you the HIDs the previous owner installed were not Bi-Xenon so there is no hi beam function built in. You need bi-xenon because these trucks only have 1 headlight bulbs

 

[rusty93xlt]

I bet you the HIDs the previous owner installed were not Bi-Xenon so there is no hi beam function built in. You need bi-xenon because these trucks only have 1 headlight bulbs

How do you tell which type they are?

I'm not crazy about HID's at all, they're coming out in favor of regular style bulbs. When the HID's go in does the headlight housing get modified so that you can't go back to stock?

 

[01STrunner]

I'm not sure how to tell if they are or are not. As fas as modified housings, based on how all the mods are cheap I can bet you they didn't retrofit projectors in like you are supposed to when doing an HID conversion so the housings should be fine but you would be able to tell if they were modified once you took the bulbs out and tried to put normal halogens in. Worst case is the halogens don't work and you take them back until you get new housings.

 

[rusty93xlt]

Thanks!

No photos yet but it's a really sharp looking rig. Tan/kahki grey in color with brushguard, running boards, tail light guards and a vinyl floor like a fleet truck would have.

Any ideas as to what the tranny issues could be and why the 4WD is inop?

 

[MidnightRebel07]

Not sure about the 4wd not working at all, even the dash lights not coming on. As for the O/d light flashing and the truck straining to get above 50mph mine has been doing this for a about two months so I just drive with the o/d off and use it for local short city runs to make the trans last long enough to do my V8, C6, 1356 manual transfercase swap hopefully before end of summer. Usually when you get the "flashing o/d light of death" means the transmission is on it's way out (could be today, could be a year from now) but it's been abused.

Make sure all of the fuses, relays and circuits are still in the truck, from all the listed half-ass mods that the previous owner did I wouldn't doubt that he removed stuff that wasn't working properly just to get the lights out.

 

[rusty93xlt]

Got most of the aftermarket stuff out and removed about 60FT of extra wires. This thing had atleast 2 different alarms and 2 different kill switches, one of them hidden back behind the radio.

Still no reverse, neutral or 4WD.

 

[just1me]

Got any pictures of your present wiring as it is? Wondering if they may have hacked some wires or shorted some out, or messed up a ground.

 

[01STrunner]

O/D light flashing on mine turned into a trans swap for me unfortunately. The vinyl floor is great isn't it? I love that I can take my floor mats out on wheeling trips and not worry about mud at all.

 

[roamer37]

OD light flashing is trans is in limp mode, could be a wheel speed sensor or speed sensor that tells the trans to shift, are your shifts harsh? I am pretty sure the trans uses just the rear wheel sensor to shift. But either way you need to pull codes.

 

[rusty93xlt]

We've got the seats out and everything right now.

As we dug into the wiring we found one of the alarms was tied into one of the gizmos on the side of the transmission.

Not throwing any codes I can pull with a simple code reader but hooked up the dealership type code puller and it showed that the codes were cleared right before we bought it. Codes are showing a transmission shift actuator, 4WD actuator and one other thing trans related.

Shifts are not that bad actually, biggest thing being no OD and something just doesn't feel right other than the lack of neutral and reverse. After it's been driven an hour or so then shut off and restarted it will slip thru the gears at low speeds, RPM's shoot up and it catches 2nd kinda hard.