Avaraelion
New Member
- Joined
- August 26, 2022
- Messages
- 1
- Reaction score
- 1
- City, State
- Cornelia, GA
- Year, Model & Trim Level
- 2005, Explorer Sport Trac
2005 Explorer Sport Trac 4.0L SOHC Flex Adrenalin
I'm having an irregular but persistent issue with my truck. I bought it in November with 150k miles, but the engine was replaced by the dealer after 67k miles. Since I've bought it I've replaced had several things replaced that both myself and another mechanic have done:
February- Alternator (me, loss of power to all systems when I had my lights & wiper blades on. This was made worse when the audio was used in the cab. Got really bad when it was raining one night and I couldn't make it home)
May- Harmonic Balancer and Serpentine Belt (mechanic, balancer came off and was haphazardly sitting on metal pipe between the fan and engine)
July- Spark Plugs & Ignition Cables (me, P0306 code and running rough. Changed them all since I was doing 1 anyways and to refresh them. they looked old)
August- Ignition Coils(me, trying to fix the problem I'm currently having)
My current problem:
4 weeks ago I was driving 70mph on a highway and my check engine started flashing and when I pressed the accelerator it couldn't maintain the speed and slowly started to decelerate but not as much as if I were to let go of the pedal. This happened for 15 seconds, I felt the engine begin to accelerate again, and after a couple more flashes the light disappeared. I pulled over but the truck seemed fine after opening the hood and letting it run for a bit. I tried to recreate the issue but no matter what I did it wouldn't happen.
Fast forward 3 days it happened on the way home from work. I was going up a hill (I live in Northeast GA so this is pretty much every drive I do) and when the engine came under load it happened again (I was going 63-65mph.) Same time frame of flashing and loss of power from the engine and then the light disappears. I didn't pull over this time (didn't want to be late for work.) On the way home it happened again. I did pull over, but I still couldn't tell that anything was wrong. I've checked all my fluids, my vacuum lines for leaks, wear on the plug cables, the condition of my belt... The engine light still didn't come on, but I went to Autozone and used their OBD II checker and there were neither active nor pending codes. BUT, on the way to work the next day it happened and did leave the check engine light on. After work I checked it and it returned a pending P0300, P0302, & P0306. I drove to a place where I can work on my truck and pulled out the spark plugs from cylinder 6 & 2. From what I couldn't tell they looked just fine. There was no carbon build-up yet and the gap was correct. Cables seemed good too.
I googled the issue and couldn't get a definitive answer as to what it could be. I though since the 2nd & 6th cylinder shared a coil to change the ignition coil. The truck seemed more responsive & powerful but the issue reappeared the following morning. Since then it's been getting worse & worse. This morning it happened 6 times in 12 mile trip to get my haircut. It seems to only happen when: 1. I'm accelerating or maintaining speed & 2. The engine is under load. My dad has a Bluedriver OBD II reader and it will show a live readout of several variables. I have my speed, rpm, throttle position (TP), load pct, timing, and fuel rail pressure. I've noticed that my TP idles at 19.6% and my engine is normally under a high load. The truck doesn't accelerate very fast (0-60 in like 20 seconds not aggressively, TP around 35-40%) but the load is like 85-97%.
Most importantly though, I'm getting irregular spikes (upward & downward) in the data. They can happen on a single sensor or on separate sensors simultaneously. Vehicle speed will dip to 0, rpm will go to like 9k or 12k, TP will spike to like 80%, Load will dip to 6.3%, timing is all over the place from -57.5° to 40°, and fuel rail pressure (which always stays between 327-360 kPa) will dip to 0 and spike to 12,000. This makes absolutely no sense to me. The trucks drives the same. EXCEPT, I've noticed that when the loss of power/flashing engine light happens there is a spike on several charts.
That's pretty much all the info I have. I don't have thousands of dollars to spend on a mechanic. Does anyone have an idea of what's going on??? I'm at the end of my rope.
I'm having an irregular but persistent issue with my truck. I bought it in November with 150k miles, but the engine was replaced by the dealer after 67k miles. Since I've bought it I've replaced had several things replaced that both myself and another mechanic have done:
February- Alternator (me, loss of power to all systems when I had my lights & wiper blades on. This was made worse when the audio was used in the cab. Got really bad when it was raining one night and I couldn't make it home)
May- Harmonic Balancer and Serpentine Belt (mechanic, balancer came off and was haphazardly sitting on metal pipe between the fan and engine)
July- Spark Plugs & Ignition Cables (me, P0306 code and running rough. Changed them all since I was doing 1 anyways and to refresh them. they looked old)
August- Ignition Coils(me, trying to fix the problem I'm currently having)
My current problem:
4 weeks ago I was driving 70mph on a highway and my check engine started flashing and when I pressed the accelerator it couldn't maintain the speed and slowly started to decelerate but not as much as if I were to let go of the pedal. This happened for 15 seconds, I felt the engine begin to accelerate again, and after a couple more flashes the light disappeared. I pulled over but the truck seemed fine after opening the hood and letting it run for a bit. I tried to recreate the issue but no matter what I did it wouldn't happen.
Fast forward 3 days it happened on the way home from work. I was going up a hill (I live in Northeast GA so this is pretty much every drive I do) and when the engine came under load it happened again (I was going 63-65mph.) Same time frame of flashing and loss of power from the engine and then the light disappears. I didn't pull over this time (didn't want to be late for work.) On the way home it happened again. I did pull over, but I still couldn't tell that anything was wrong. I've checked all my fluids, my vacuum lines for leaks, wear on the plug cables, the condition of my belt... The engine light still didn't come on, but I went to Autozone and used their OBD II checker and there were neither active nor pending codes. BUT, on the way to work the next day it happened and did leave the check engine light on. After work I checked it and it returned a pending P0300, P0302, & P0306. I drove to a place where I can work on my truck and pulled out the spark plugs from cylinder 6 & 2. From what I couldn't tell they looked just fine. There was no carbon build-up yet and the gap was correct. Cables seemed good too.
I googled the issue and couldn't get a definitive answer as to what it could be. I though since the 2nd & 6th cylinder shared a coil to change the ignition coil. The truck seemed more responsive & powerful but the issue reappeared the following morning. Since then it's been getting worse & worse. This morning it happened 6 times in 12 mile trip to get my haircut. It seems to only happen when: 1. I'm accelerating or maintaining speed & 2. The engine is under load. My dad has a Bluedriver OBD II reader and it will show a live readout of several variables. I have my speed, rpm, throttle position (TP), load pct, timing, and fuel rail pressure. I've noticed that my TP idles at 19.6% and my engine is normally under a high load. The truck doesn't accelerate very fast (0-60 in like 20 seconds not aggressively, TP around 35-40%) but the load is like 85-97%.
Most importantly though, I'm getting irregular spikes (upward & downward) in the data. They can happen on a single sensor or on separate sensors simultaneously. Vehicle speed will dip to 0, rpm will go to like 9k or 12k, TP will spike to like 80%, Load will dip to 6.3%, timing is all over the place from -57.5° to 40°, and fuel rail pressure (which always stays between 327-360 kPa) will dip to 0 and spike to 12,000. This makes absolutely no sense to me. The trucks drives the same. EXCEPT, I've noticed that when the loss of power/flashing engine light happens there is a spike on several charts.
That's pretty much all the info I have. I don't have thousands of dollars to spend on a mechanic. Does anyone have an idea of what's going on??? I'm at the end of my rope.
