2006 message center stopped working

[catdog1963]

Hello all, I am a long time lurker here and love all of the useful information I've found. I recently bought a 2006 XLS 2WD. Its in great shape and my wife loves it, but the standard message center has quit working. I called my local Ford dealer who quoted me $430 to repair my speedometer cluster with message center along with $135 labor. They said they would send mine in for exchange. can't I send it in myself? Is this a common problem? Are there cheaper options? I have searched the forums for an answer but can't find anything that works. Thanks for any input.

 

[Flag Gibby]

There are a couple of TSB's for the 06's regarding the message center. I even had to have mine replaced because of dead pixels in it (luckily under the new vehicle warrantee). I believe that when you change out the message center you have to save existing information from it before removing and then transfer it to the new unit and the older message center style is no longer manufactured so the old unit has to be exchanged for a remanufactured unit. You really don't have very many options since a dead message center can cause the vehicle to not start according to one of the TSB's.

You can look at the TSB's here: http://www.bbbind.com/free_tsb.html