My brother has a new GMC pickup and twice he has had big repair bills because squirrels have chewed his wiring. He says GM uses some type of new wire harness made from soy bean or peanut products for some PC environmental reasons. Evidently the squirrels are attracted to it. My question is has anyone had this problem with a Ford pick-up. I have a 2011 Platinum which is garage kept and very few squirrels in my neighborhood. He's so pissed he wants to buy a Ford if they don't have this problem.

 

It's not a new f150, but I worked with someone 10 years ago that they just loved chewing on those wires for whatever reason. Did cause some serious damage.

 

Squirrels ...... over the years I've had them chew into both low pressure rubber fuel lines, high pressure plastic EFI fuel lines, nibble on brake hoses on my '77, eat into vapor lines and a rubber crossover on my '95 T-bird, eat into the large rubber connector for fuiel filler on my '77, eat silicone spark plug wire insulation on the '77, almost chewed through one of the several wires in the harness to the FPDM of my '07 which I found when checking it for corrosion, and once my '77 failed inspection when no lights worked at rear .... go home to fix and they had eaten into the harness below the tailgate.

I recently heard that spraying the harnesses / lines with undercoating will stop it.

My solution is repair damage and find some way to shield it, wrap with split tube or heavy plastic tubing or replace with metal.

Not the worst, but what pissed me off most was when I found where a mouse ate a hole in the headliner of my '67 Chevelle SS.

 

Rodents will get anywhere they want and chew anything they want......I've seen engine harnesses, rubber/plastic tubing, and interiors totally destroyed by mice, rats, rabbits, and squirrels.........

 

i had lots of them at my old place and never had a problem with chewing threw the wires on my truck. they used to eat though the one shed and store there pine cones in it.you would patch the hole and in a few days they would have a new one. i have heard of them getting into attics and chewing the wires and causing house fires.

 

time to go hunt for squirrels there

 

I have a 2011 F150 and I feed cookies to squirrels so they are all over my back yard in town here and they have not yet attacked my wire harness when I have ran out of cookies for a few days.

 

Buy lots of cookies and corn!

 

I had chipmunks chew wires in the Edge I drove. Cost about 350 to have it repaired. They had to pull the intake manifold off.

I got one of these:

http://www.ratzapper.com/view.cfm?ProductID=4

 

Not to deter a potential Ford buyer, but I did have a squirrel problem earlier this year with my old '04 F-150. Chewed thru some wires that feed the COP on cyl #7. What a pain to try and find a new pigtail to splice on there.

I've also been finding hickory nuts on top of my motor pretty much ever since I started driving. Always have problems with squirrels....

 

What's the cumulative body count, and how long have you had it?

 

A trick we use in the desert southwest is to leave your hood partially open. Just 5 or 6 inches to let in light and it will deter the critters from hanging around under the hood.

 

Destroyed my 2001 a couple years back. Chewed various wires and shorted out the PCM. Got my 2010 now and have a similar issue, acorns inside the hood and nests in the engine valley. Same with my wifes Explorer, big nest in the air intake box and chewed all of the firewall material to make a nest.

 

Man, I thought crickets were annoying. I have squirrels around, but apparently they're well fed, because they've left me alone pretty much.

 

Then you have larger rodents under your truck...look at the pic above.