hafcanadian
Member
- Joined
- October 18, 2013
- Messages
- 24
- Reaction score
- 17
- Location
- Oregon
- City, State
- Oregon
- Year, Model & Trim Level
- 1997 Ford Explorer Ltd.
The cooling and air conditioning systems on our 1997 Limited have been worked on several times since the summer of 2012 by several Ford dealerships. Functionally everything works fine now, but right after the first repair during a trip to Nebraska, a coolant and thermostat change, I noticed that the temperature guage needle never got above the first mark on the scale above the "C". Always before it worked its way to and stabilized at about 20% of the way up the scale.
I returned to the dealer and commented to the repair tech, and he retested everything, but said the thermostat and everything was working properly and the temps matched Ford's prescribed numbers. He surmised that there may be an electrical issue behind the guage panel.
The AC stopped functioning last year, and my local dealer in Portland, OR, serviced it, but it would fail on me the next day. That happened twice more; they thought they'd found and fixed leaks, but hadn't - with a few hours standtime, it lost pressure/fluid. They finally replaced a tube and canister along the top and to the right of the engine that I'd pointed out was pretty corroded, and though expensive, that did the job. Why they wouldn't have suspected the leak was there in the first place I don't know.
My service advisor checked out the coolant system once more, opted to replace the thermostat housing as I recall, and remarked my guage issue might be related to some device or housing low in the system that was hard to get at and labor-intensive to replace. He named the part, but I'd never heard of it and the name of it didn't stick. He did not believe the guage thing was due to a panel electrical problem.
A few weeks ago I noticed the guage occasionally moved up to the 20% point on the scale, and would immediately glide back to the bottom of the scale; shortly it would ease upward and back down again. It does this repeated thing all the time now. Hey, at least it doesn't stay at the bottom anymore. My concern is that the guage may not be reliable enough to let me know in an overheat situation. My service advisor doesn't share that worry.
Is it possible the Nebraska tech was correct and it might just be a corroded or loose connection behind the guage panel that has high resistance? Or is my local service advisor more on track about the other cooling system part that he deems too expensive to fix just to get the guage to run right? I have noticed that some of the backlighting behind the tach window seems to have dimmed or be out, so perhaps there is a concern behind the panel afterall.
I returned to the dealer and commented to the repair tech, and he retested everything, but said the thermostat and everything was working properly and the temps matched Ford's prescribed numbers. He surmised that there may be an electrical issue behind the guage panel.
The AC stopped functioning last year, and my local dealer in Portland, OR, serviced it, but it would fail on me the next day. That happened twice more; they thought they'd found and fixed leaks, but hadn't - with a few hours standtime, it lost pressure/fluid. They finally replaced a tube and canister along the top and to the right of the engine that I'd pointed out was pretty corroded, and though expensive, that did the job. Why they wouldn't have suspected the leak was there in the first place I don't know.
My service advisor checked out the coolant system once more, opted to replace the thermostat housing as I recall, and remarked my guage issue might be related to some device or housing low in the system that was hard to get at and labor-intensive to replace. He named the part, but I'd never heard of it and the name of it didn't stick. He did not believe the guage thing was due to a panel electrical problem.
A few weeks ago I noticed the guage occasionally moved up to the 20% point on the scale, and would immediately glide back to the bottom of the scale; shortly it would ease upward and back down again. It does this repeated thing all the time now. Hey, at least it doesn't stay at the bottom anymore. My concern is that the guage may not be reliable enough to let me know in an overheat situation. My service advisor doesn't share that worry.
Is it possible the Nebraska tech was correct and it might just be a corroded or loose connection behind the guage panel that has high resistance? Or is my local service advisor more on track about the other cooling system part that he deems too expensive to fix just to get the guage to run right? I have noticed that some of the backlighting behind the tach window seems to have dimmed or be out, so perhaps there is a concern behind the panel afterall.
