Who has had their truck go into fail safe mode and if Ford fixed the problem, what was the culprit? Some have had the throttle body replacement fix the problem, I believe.


My Lariat S-crew at 1500 miles went into fail safe mode. 2 engine restarts and then the check engine light comes on without the fail safe mode.

Now 800 miles later, 2 trips to the service dept. and several more occurances like the one described above. Ford says they dont know what is going on and to be patient.They say it may take several months to figure the problem out. Well it has went into Fail safe mode 3 of the last 4 days. Truck was picked up 1/18.

I am a patient person, but this is unacceptable when this problem happens almost every day now. Some times it takes 3 restarts to get it out of failsafe mode.

Any advice would be appreciated.

 

Mine did one time and never again. I'm a master tech at a ford dealer. I've checked into it and have found nothing. It may have to become more consistant for me to see what happened. I did nt see any TSB's on it yet.

 

Mine went into fail safe mode for the first time last night and I just did a restart and it went off and didn't come back on...

What exactly does fail safe mode mean? And does the truck drive different in fail safe mode???

antonio

 

My truck was in the shop three times for going into the failsafe mode. I believe they reprogrammed the PCM each time. It then went into the failsafe mode again while I was in Stowe, VT. I had to have it towed to Albany, NY and arrange transportation back to Albany at my own expense (the roadside assistance and customer assistance people were useless). It's been sitting at the dealership since March 5th as Ford has no fix for the problem. A Ford rep called me last Thursday and offered a replacement truck. I agreed because I loved the truck when it was working. They will only trade stickerprice to stickerprice though, and to get the exact same truck it will cost me an additional $600 -700. I told the dealer that this was unacceptable and he said the rep would call me back on Friday. He never did. The truck has 4500 miles on it and has been in the shop 35 days as of today (I also had steering wheel problems ). I have all the documentation and am sending in a lemon law application tomorrow. I'm hoping the rep will come through with a new truck at no additional cost before the application is accepted into the arbitration program, but if he doesn't I'm lemoning it.

 

My F150 has been in the shop for 10 days awaiting a back-ordered part after my latest fail-safe episode. My truck went into fail save about a half-dozen times within 30 minutes before the engine light came on as I drove it to the dealer. I believe the part on back order is an injection mount or ingition mount. Anyone else out there had a similar problem?

 

Anyone know exactly what fail safe mode means??

My truck went on fail safe mode two times this morning, and now the check engine light has been on permanently.

Do you guys think it would be unsafe to drive 330 miles for a ski trip with the possibility of a fail safe mode warning and the check engine light on??

antonio

 

Neptuno1,
I believe the engine doesnt fire every piston when in fail safe mode. The engine will run rough and will limit some capabilities, like cruise control when in this mode. The purpose is to protect the engine when the computer senses a critical error that can damage the engine. A good scenario would be if the engine lost coolant, not all pistons fire like they normally would to keep the engine from overheating. Someone can correct me if I am wrong.

Your truck sounds like its doing the same thing mine does. It only does it upon the first minute of startup and goes to the check engine light after 1-3 restarts. I did run mine on a 300 mile trip with no problems. If it goes into fail safe mode then restart it until it goes away. Do get it checked out though to get it documented.

My truck is in the shop right now. They say they have a new computer reflash available as of this morning. We'll see.

Thanks for the responses and I will let everyone know the outcome.

 

I have and here's my story:

https://www.f150online.com/forums/sh...=failsafe+mode

bottom line, once I got the new throttle body the truck runs great.

 

NotBigEnuf,

I read that thread the other day. Good to hear every thing is still fine. I am kind of curious on who else got a new throttle body and if their truck is fine now.

They tried the new computer update yesterday. Its too early to tell if it fixed the problem. I should know by this weekend. If the problem reoccurs, I'm pushing for the new throttle body.

 

I was having the same problem with mine, sometimes it was the engine light on , sometimes it was the wrench and went into limp mode.
There is a new program out now for your computer, jus came out this week, has worked so far on my truck.

apparently the Tech guy told my dealer that they had the sensors set to sensitive, and that they were picking up stuff that they didn't have to , so this is the fix.

Go see your dealers!!

 

Just thought I would let those with the same problem know that its been a week and and the new PCM update did seem to fix it.

 

I'm still waiting to hear from dealer. I've brought it in twice for this problem. I've called a few times since then. They say they are keepng in contact with Ford for any updates. It's been 2 months!!About 2 weeks age my service engine light went off and it has not gone into fail-safe mode for about 4 weeks. I wonder did the problem go away! The silence from Ford and the dealer is really ticking me off. Should I bother letting them touch my vehicle at this point.I have not heard any definitive answer to this problem.

 

I can agree with what 2 other people said on here...The computer reflash does work. I took mine to the dealer expecting the worse and was very happy when I found out the throttle body did not need to be replaced. They did the PCM reflash and since then (has been 2 weeks) has worked normally.

antonio

 

I have this same problem and I am awaiting a backordered throttle body. I have had my truck psm flashed twice and still have the problem. I haven't had it done in about a month, so how new is this reflash you are all talking about. I would love to get this thing fixed, it is really annoying.

 

I have has the same problem with my work truck. I got on Dec 2003 and have put 10000 miles on it. About a month ago, the engine light came on permenantly. After driving about 10 mins, the wrench light would come on and the truck was sluggish, vibrating too much, wouldn't downshift when passing, and the cruise control didnt work. I ttok it into the dealership three times, and all the did was reprogram the computer, but they never fixed it. Finally i took it in and they found that the throttle position sensor was faulty and had to order a new one from the factory. This repair finally fixed the problem. It seems that i'm not the only one to have had this problem, and i'm not very impressed with Ford.