Originally posted by GreenHornet:
Originally posted by sysanalyst:
Originally posted by GreenHornet:
Does anyone know anything about having to replace the ECM?



If the trouble is truly the ECM and your vehicle has less than 100,000 miles on it, and is less that 7 years old, the Dealer will have to replace it under the federal emissions warranty of your vehicle.

Usually, when the ECM is posting codes and the engine is running, it has not failed. Now if you have jumpered your car "backward" and have "cooked" the electrical system by this polarity reversal, then you could very well have destroyed the PCM. That aside, I'd suspect that cheap Contour wirining harness from the PCM to the engine. The wires are know to have insulation cracks, the connectors get brittle and decompose in a short amount of time, and when you add a little seeping engine oil, road salt, and rain water... well... things begin to go wrong in a big way.

Head over to "Wally World", plunk down $80 for a code reader, read the PCM codes, and post them here. It is quite possible that a single fault is creating a "ripple effect" and generating other codes. Example; MAF is reading high due to an insulation problem, causes fuel injectors to run rich, causes upstream O2 sensor to read ultra rich, and then the downstream O2 sensor reads rich indicating a faulty cat. The PCM tries to adjust and reaches programmed limits. This will leave quite a few codes in the PCM, although the cause is only a single simple issue.

Keep the code reader until you are done, and then take it back to Wally-World for a full refund.

Post them codes!



Thanks for the great information!! I've gotten the codes scanned at AZ and posted them here. I took the good information I was given from here to my mechanic. I will share the information you posted above with him, though. I hope there isn't much that will need to be done. I've spent way too much this year on my car...most of it was maintenance, but 1/3 has been dealing with these continuing CEL's. Thanks!



Apparently the ECM is bad. I called the Ford dealer, and apparently the emissions warranty is only 8 years or 80,000 miles. I'm unfortunately at 82,000! I'm going to ask my garage, though, when their computer shows I started having the CEL problems that ultimately led to the determination that the ECM is bad. If it was before 80,000 miles, and I can document it, I'm hoping that I have a case for a warranty claim. I REALLY don't want to spend another $350 on this issue.

2002 Nissan Maxima SE Former 2000 SVT Contour owner