Contour Enthusiasts Group Archives Forums General General Attention 95/96/97 Contour/Mystique owners!

I don't know--is the insulation on your battery wires very brittle and flaking off? If so, it's the same problem, although I do not know if it's covered under the harness recall.

Brian

It does apply to the battery wiring. My insulation was completely corroded away on the positive battery terminal. I have pictures. I'll post them later tonight.

We need to have this option added to our message editing screens to reflect our true feelings about the wiring harness issues:

http://www.escape-central.com/1forum/images/smilies/cuss.gif

Regards,

Jab

Oh crap...is that on the starter side of the cable, looks like it from the photos? At least that one will be pretty easy to cover with heat-shrink tubing when you find out that the replacement from Ford is $500 (just kidding).

Brian

Here's the post I made on the flatratetech forum. None of them have commented on it as of yet; it seems that they can call names and insult people's intelligence, but when it comes to actually saying something intelligent...

The post:

In a nutshell, the problem with the wire that Ford used in the Contour (which has been a fairly predictable, if not quite reliable, car--it has a few "pattern failures" and to be quite honest the performance more than made up for any lack of reliability) is that it is only rated for 170F temperatures.

This wire is known as GPT, or "general purpose thermoplastic". The insulation used is PVC. It can be identified by applying a soldering iron to the insulation, which will be melted by the heat.

How hot do you suppose it gets under the intake manifold and above the engine where those wires run? I'd guess up to 190 degrees or even hotter on a 95 degree summer day, what do you think?

The correct wire to use in this application is SXL/GXL/TXL (depending on the desired insulation thickness). The insulation used is called crosslinked PVC. When a soldering iron is applied, the insulation will not melt. Continued exposure to heat will cause a "popcorn" effect, but it will not melt.

[As a side note, it is my observation that crosslinked PVC is noticeably different from plain PVC...in particular, it seems more flexible or "supple" and it feels more like rubber than PVC]

This insulation is designed for temperatures of up to 258F. As you can see, this is far more suitable for the temperatures that might be expected under an intake manifold in a tight engine compartment on a hot summer day.

Now that we've identified that the wire is not suitable for the temperatures it is exposed to, what are the effects of exposure to those temperatures? The effects are:

1)The insulation becomes brittle over time.

2)The insulation, because it is brittle, starts to crack when the wires are moved.

3)The cracking eventually results in loss of the insulation in large pieces.

4)The loss of insulation eventually results in corrosion of the exposed copper wire, with resultant increase in circuit resistance (not to mention short circuits).

5)This can lead to a vehicle fire and has on several occasions (according to the NHTSA's web site).

One possible failure mode would be one of the wires from the injectors back to the PCM grounding out due to the insulation flaking off.

This would result in the injector staying open constantly, running that cylinder VERY rich and overheating the cats, perhaps also overheating and melting the injector (they aren't designed for a 100% duty cycle!) resulting in fuel spraying all over the engine compartment. Maybe one of the other wires, having been corroded, will be carrying enough current to be glowing red hot, igniting the fuel spraying everywhere.

But that's just one possibility...the bottom line is, if there are bare wires in the engine compartment, anything can happen and none of it good.

Brian, Actually that is the Positive battery terminal that goes into the Fuse box ajacent to the battery. It's routed under the battery and rubs against the body which if corroded can cause it to ground out. Pulling down the voltage and not allowing the battery to recharge.

On my way to the Ford Dealer to get this and the rest of the harnesses fixed the car died on the interstate. I had to exit the interstate (Not easy to do with a car that has no Brakes or PS) and get it towed to the dealership. They replaced everything that I asked for so I was very happy but it did take them 4 days to complete the repair. Also that Terminal is 86 bucks.

The side that is worst corroded is where the harness contacted the body. If it had continued to detiriorate ad still function it would have been inside the fuse box and if any other wires in the fuse box were corroded then I'm sure you can guess the electrical mayhem that would have ensued.

Geez....this is so rampant and pathetic.....I can't believe Ford did this to save what......$0.30 per car?? Now it costs all of us at least $400........

WOW! Mine is stripped just like that in the picture! Maybe that explains why my new alternator went dead after 3 months! What do I tell the dealership when I get the car there? I'd rather have them fix it for a week than driving with bad wires!

My 95 SE has only 71k miles, so I'm interested in getting any bad wires/harnesses fixed on Ford's dime.

Questions:

1) Where can I read the text of this dealership letter/Ford program?

2) What wiring harness(es) is covered by this 100k 'warranty'?

3) At what/where should I be looking to see if I have any brittle/cracked wires, or worse? I don't plan to remove the intake manifold!

4) What should I ask the dealer to look at?

5) Can I expect the dealer to do any serious digging/investigation, or just do a quick visual check?

6) If the dealer finds one problem, are they obligated by this program to replace "everything" or just the part(s) that are bad?

Not sure where you can go to read the letter.

The cracking is, most likely, going to be visible on the engine coolant temperature sensor wiring. If you remove the tubing and expose the wires that connect to the two 12-pos'n connectors you may be able to see some cracking there.

I believe the recall replaces ALL of the underhood wiring. This includes the fuel injection harness and the computer harness.

As to what kind of inspection your dealer will do, that depends on how honest they are. Understand that most dealers/techs do NOT want to perform this recall because they get paid less for recall/warranty work. So there is an incentive for them to not look too hard to find the problem.

Brian