HI Folks,
I have a 2004 FX4, 5.6L and it's been one of the best trucks I've ever owned. Just this past weekend I noticed my windshield washer fluid wouldnt spray and after examination I found the hose from the firewall that runs in back of the battery to the fluid tank was broke. My intention was to simply add a splicer back to connect both hose ends but I had to remove the battery and tray first to access it. When I removed the battery and tray I started finding all kinds of pieces of cut vacuum hoses, cut electrical harness sections, vacuum plugs, etc. and I noticed the small solenoid on the firewall directly in back of the battery had it's wires snipped completely off but the plug was still plugged in. The vacuum hose that runs to the small box on the back of the battery tray was also cut and the dual rubber plug on the bottom of the solenoid was torn. After doing some research on here I identified the solenoid as CWE but I only have one on the firewall but I see an empty space on the braket where a second one could be. Should there be one or two CWE solenoids? About one year after I purchased the truck my 4x4 system started locking up and I was told it was this solenoid that normally has vacuum for 2x4 and not for 4x4, and that they repaced the bad solenoid. It now appears the entire CWE has been removed from the truck. The odd thing is my truck 4x4 has worked fine ever since that repair, although when I tested it tonight I found the dash indicator doesnt work but it does engage to 4x4. I'm a little concerned my repair was a Mickey Mouse job by the dealer and the real R&R never happened. I have saved all the pieces and parts in a bag to show the dealer I now use and Im going to bring it in and ask what they think.

Anyone seen anything like this before?



Thanks,
Shane

 

I recently took my 07 by the dealer to check out a loose cowl cover. I noticed it was sticking up and I had to push it down to open the hood. I tried to press it down to see if it snapped into place, it did not, so since it is under warranty I took it by the dealer. I set up an appointment and to take it by the following morning. I come back late that evening and the service writer said they had it fixed and since there were no broken parts, it wouldn't cost me anything....I just smiled and said great.

After waiting 20 minutes for someone to bring my truck around to me, I asked the guy driving if he was the one that worked on the truck. He said no but I filled out the warranty claim. He told me that it looked like someone had been messing around with the cowl, trying to take it off. I told him I was the only one that used the truck and I am rarely away from it, and I didn't do anything but try to push it down when I noticed it pushed up. The entire experience with the service writer and the mechanic both seemed to be very accusational and like they were doing me a favor by fixing it under warranty and not charging me anything.

The next day, I looked under the hood and whoever had done the work, did not properly reinstall the hood seal, which takes about 15 seconds to install properly. It was half way off sitting on top of the engine. This just seemed to me to be a very simply warranty situation that was made unnecessarily unpleasant and then topped off by half a** attention to detail in a simple task. Sorry I couldn't help you with some of your problems, but I guess I just needed to vent. I have always hated dealing with dealerships and this just reinforces my feelings about it.

In your situation, I would take the truck back to the dealer and start with the service manager and keep moving up the chain until I got reasonable solution to fix my truck the way it should have been done the first time. Good luck