Ford Fairmont Problems

CONTACT Ford Customer Assistance for a plausible explanation. There is clearly something wrong with either the wheels or the caps themselves that is causing them to fall off.

I ASKED Mark Lynch of Carcool for his opinion. He thought the fault could be either the ambient temperature sensor or a faulty climate-control unit itself. The ambient sensor behind the front bumper tells the climate control the outside temperature. If this goes open circuit, the control will assume that it is -50C and will switch to full heating. The climate control unit itself could have a faulty component, dry-joint in the board, or bad connection plug. Try changing the ambient sensor and clean its connector. If it fails again, replace the climate control head.

YOU don't say if your car has a factory LPG system or an aftermarket one, but I will make the assumption that it was a Vialle system fitted by Tickford for Ford. The Australian Liquid Petroleum Gas Association says its important for good running that the ignition system be well maintained because LP requires a stronger spark than petrol to fire. Make sure the ignition system, plugs, leads and ignition packs are serviced, and the LPG converter is properly drained regularly. The Vialle system was imported by Boral Gas, so if you still have problems, ALPA recommend contacting Boral for advice.

EVERY engine has valve recession, whether running on petrol, LPG or your grandma's bath water, but it happens at a faster rate on engines running on LPG. Your engine will have some valve recession, and switching to LPG will accelerate the wear. You could have to rebuild the heads sooner than you might if you stuck with petrol. The way around the problem with LPG is to fit a dual-fuel system and regularly run the engine on petrol to lubricate the valves and valve seats with lead, as happens when it runs on petrol alone. If you follow a routine of using petrol, say for an hour or two a week, you shouldn't have any problem. Upper-cylinder lubricants are available that protect the valves and valve seats from wear.

SOUNDS as if you have a nice Fairlane there, Steve, and it seems a shame to sell it when it has such low mileage and is giving you good service. Instead of buying the V8 I'd consider an EB Falcon XR6 because I reckon you'd prefer the performance of that over the Ghia. Sure, the leather and the sports suspension sound great, but the XR6 will eat it for breakfast. Returning to the V8, the Windsor is a good, solid engine that gives little trouble and is good when converted to LPG. As you say, it is all steel, with cast-iron block and heads.

TRANSMISSION specialist John De Sensi of Gear-Matics says he hasn't heard of your problem. He says the main issue with the Falcon auto is it's not well enough cooled and this leads to problems at 150,000-190,000km. The auto oil pan is too small and doesn't contain enough oil, which leads to the oil overheating. The best solution is to fit an oil cooler, which adds to the volume of oil available for cooling. The other problem is that the tiny brass oil cooler in the radiator breaks down and flakes of brass pass through the system and clog the filters in the transmission. This also causes overheated oil. One possible cause of your problem is a high idle speed. To check this you need to see a Ford specialist and have them run their diagnostic program over the engine.

ACCORDING to Mark Lynch of Carcool Airconditioning, there are three possible causes of ``no heat'' with this EF Fairmont: a blocked heater core, a faulty blend door motor or a broken heater flap shaft. To diagnose the problem, set the control on manual floor and the fan speed at medium and, with your hand over the floor outlet, range the temperature from 16-32 degrees and back. You should feel a variation from cold to warm back to cold, If you do, you have a blocked heater core. If there is no temperature variation, it will be the blend door motor or a broken shaft. You can confirm which one by doing a climate control self-test (refer to a Ford manual) which will confirm an E2 error (blend door faulty) or, if no fault is shown, it will be a broken flap shaft.

IT IS unlikely the problem is related to the ABS. It is more likely to be the wear in the disc. It is not unusual to machine discs on Falcons every time they're serviced. It is a common complaint.

THUMPING in Ford autos is usually caused by the S5 solenoid, Geoff Clay of CPA Automatics says, though it's unusual to get it at such low mileage. The problem is usually seen as a flare-bump while upshifting. It can happen on one-two shifts as well as higher shifts. Geoff says it's worth having the transmission serviced, even though manufacturers do not recommend servicing as much as they once did.

THE advantage of LPG is that you need only one tank, so you get around problems such as having to relocate the spare wheel, but you are relying on having LPG wherever you go. That's not a huge problem because about almost half of the servos in most areas have LPG. But if you want to take a trip around Australia, I would prefer the option of both fuels.