Contour Enthusiasts Group Archives Forums General Troubleshooting Two small problems - your opinions welcome

First problem: The 98 Duratec's intermittant CEL is back again for the 4th time in the last 5 months. I'm almost positive it's the gas cap. After tightening it 1/2 to 1 full turn after the clicks start, you can untwist it with no effort at all, almost as tho you forgot to tighten it all the way to begin with. Also after tightening you can pull up and down a quarter inch or so which indicates there really isn't any seal between the cap and mating surface on the inlet tube.

Question: bad cap, bad gasket, or bad mating surface on the inlet? Cost to replace/repair? Can you buy the gasket separate from the cap or will Ford insist on selling you a new cap to get a new gasket? Anyone have any experience with this problem or a solution?

Second problem: At cold startup the belt on the '97 Zetec has started making a repetitive clacking sound right where it passes under the upper idler pulley. Doesn't start immediately but after 5-10 seconds and gradually quiets and disappears within a few minutes as the engine (or the belt?)warms. Also disappears if you start reving it a little. Car has 60K and the belt was replaced (OEM at the dealer)last summer at 54K. Belt looks great. Loose Belt? Bad Pulley? Opinions?

On #1, from your description it sounds like the cap, although on mine the recurrent CEL tripping was traced to a faulty inlet/filler tube. It was fixed under warranty, so I don't know what the cost would be. If you know someone else who has a Contique, you could try their cap to see if you still get the play when it's tightened; if so, I'd guess the filler tube was the problem.

On #2 there is an updated upper cambelt cover that stops the belt slap at cold ,take a look at the cover,should see witness marks, some members 'stad off ' the cover with washers..

Terry, is the belt slapping the cover a bad think, will it hurt anything??? or just make that noise all the time?
My 97 zetec makes that slapping noise too but when I took off the cover, I couldn't see any signs that it was touching, but if I put my hand on the cover, I could feel it hitting ... but yet it doesn't make that noise w/ the cover off so it has to be hitting.

I had a similar problem as well. The CEL Code read as a bad o2 sensor, Ford replaced one o2 sensor (actually they ended up replacing all of them ) the code would return after every change. Then the tech pulled the plugs and found that the front bank of cyls was running normal and the rear bank was running rich. He replaced the computer and the new comp started to report a different code (pcv or something like that) in the end it was a $15 part but the old computer was a little laking in brain power to tell that.