Ross
10-07-2005, 03:20 PM
Well, this is part rant and part plea for diagnostic help.
Yesterday my MM with 71 K got a Check Engine light for the first time. OK, I was planning on taking it in for an oil change this morning anyway. My regular service advisor wasn't there, so another guy says that they will change the oil and check the code on the light.
After waiting too long, I go to the guy and ask what's going on. He tells me that when they hooked up the computer to my car, it came up with a code for the MAF, but then it blew the computer on the car, and now the car won't start. I'm not too happy about this, and we begin to talk about the situation. He talks about reprogramming the computer, and I tell him to take out my chip first so it doesn't destroy the programming on it.
A light goes off behind his eyes. "A chip! Now we can blame the electronic problems on the chip!", he's obviously thinking.
I said, "Not so fast, this car has had diagnostic computers hooked up to it a number of times since that chip was put in over 65K ago, and there has never been a problem. It's not the chip."
Well, after much fiddle farting around, they take out the chip, and download another program into my computer. The car starts.
They explained to me (and it sounded fairly reasonable AT THE TIME), that Ford has a new computer program for these cars. The chip I have was put in with the old factory program, but isn't compatible with the new program. So I drive away, chip in hand, thinking that I just need to buy a tuner ( see above thread) to put in a better program like so many people here have done. Wrong.
After awhile, the car starts acting "sluggish." I expected it to act less responsive without the chip, but this is something else.
I can punch it from a dead stop, and it almost just sits there. It accellerates VERY slowly, and at WOT you can see the RPM's increasing while the car is barely accellerating at all. It's like the engine is OK, but the power isn't being transferred to the transmission. Finally, about 5500 RPM's, something "catches", and it takes off like it's supposed to.
I know that these guys at Southwest LM in Houston screwed something up. This is obviously NOT the new MM program from Ford!
I need to get this fixed ASAP. I will, of course, be taking it in Monday morning. But in the meantime, I don't even know how much damage I might be doing to something by driving it like this.
Any suggestions on what to look for?
Thanks in advance.
Yesterday my MM with 71 K got a Check Engine light for the first time. OK, I was planning on taking it in for an oil change this morning anyway. My regular service advisor wasn't there, so another guy says that they will change the oil and check the code on the light.
After waiting too long, I go to the guy and ask what's going on. He tells me that when they hooked up the computer to my car, it came up with a code for the MAF, but then it blew the computer on the car, and now the car won't start. I'm not too happy about this, and we begin to talk about the situation. He talks about reprogramming the computer, and I tell him to take out my chip first so it doesn't destroy the programming on it.
A light goes off behind his eyes. "A chip! Now we can blame the electronic problems on the chip!", he's obviously thinking.
I said, "Not so fast, this car has had diagnostic computers hooked up to it a number of times since that chip was put in over 65K ago, and there has never been a problem. It's not the chip."
Well, after much fiddle farting around, they take out the chip, and download another program into my computer. The car starts.
They explained to me (and it sounded fairly reasonable AT THE TIME), that Ford has a new computer program for these cars. The chip I have was put in with the old factory program, but isn't compatible with the new program. So I drive away, chip in hand, thinking that I just need to buy a tuner ( see above thread) to put in a better program like so many people here have done. Wrong.
After awhile, the car starts acting "sluggish." I expected it to act less responsive without the chip, but this is something else.
I can punch it from a dead stop, and it almost just sits there. It accellerates VERY slowly, and at WOT you can see the RPM's increasing while the car is barely accellerating at all. It's like the engine is OK, but the power isn't being transferred to the transmission. Finally, about 5500 RPM's, something "catches", and it takes off like it's supposed to.
I know that these guys at Southwest LM in Houston screwed something up. This is obviously NOT the new MM program from Ford!
I need to get this fixed ASAP. I will, of course, be taking it in Monday morning. But in the meantime, I don't even know how much damage I might be doing to something by driving it like this.
Any suggestions on what to look for?
Thanks in advance.