2002 Focus Electrics - Ghosts in the machine

iMax

Hi,

Following on from my thread about using the car again after it having sat there over the big freeze. I put it on trickle charge yesterday & today took it out & it ran perfectly, apart form the following:

The radio kept raising & lowering it's volume on it's own & the instrument cluster died (all needles dropped, odometer & mileometer went blank), which is exactly what happened this time last year, although there's no flickering orange light on the dash (yet).

As far as I'm aware this hasn't happened since last year, the car is used only intermittently also.

Any ideas (esp. about the radio as that has me totally confused) ?

beachlife

I'd check the earth locations for the instruments,I think down on the driver side footwell/kick panel area

Drummerboy08

The MK1 Focus had a known problem where the high tension leads in the engine touched off each other. It happened on my 04 Focus last year ( the speedo/rev counter/gauges read zero, and engine mgmt light would flash on), and I separated the leads using a piece of plastic. It hasn't happened since. I'd say its that.

albob

Something very similar happening to my wifes 02 Focus. A couple of years ago Engine management light starting coming one. Several attempts to fix it by garage (thankfully it was within the warrenty that they gave her when she bought it) led them to replacing the dash and the fixed that issue. Now the engine management light is permanently on again, and again the garage have looked into it and think its the cat but not convinced and due to cost of replacing it have advised not to replace it as it looks fine to them. In the last couple of weeks the speedo has started dropping to zero for a couple of seconds before kicking back up to the proper millage.
Where are these high tenson leads in the engine? Is seperating them something I can do or would it need an expert? May not be caus eof our issue but worth a try.

Muckie

Dont know if this is related but just reading this months Car Mechanics
magazine(fine read) says that the MK1 Focus instrument panels
are prone to failure for no reason. BBC's Watchdog program recently
covered the problem too. Ford then had to drop the price of a replacement cluster from £350 to £50 maybe give Ford a ring.
See if they can help for a reasonally lower price.

Hal1

Muckie wrote: »

Dont know if this is related but just reading this months Car Mechanics
magazine(fine read) says that the MK1 Focus instrument panels
are prone to failure for no reason. BBC's Watchdog program recently
covered the problem too. Ford then had to drop the price of a replacement cluster from £350 to £50 maybe give Ford a ring.
See if they can help for a reasonally lower price.

That's true have read quite a few stories from the lads on focusowners about failing clocks. Sometimes resetting the ECU can cure electrical glitches like this (by this they mean disconnecting the negative on the battery for up to 45 minutes). I would check for gunk on the terminals of the battery and clean off etc. Other than that it could be a bad earth.

iMax

Cheers guys, Will check out these options tomorrow. Also interested in where to find these "high tension wires" Drummerboy

Hal1

iMax wrote: »

Cheers guys, Will check out these options tomorrow. Also interested in where to find these "high tension wires" Drummerboy

The 'HT' leads go from distributor to spark plugs.