Retrobird Coil Problems

[YellowRose]

At our local Tbird club meeting yesterday, one of our new members told us of a problem that he had been having with his 2005 Retrobird's engine missing.

He ran an engine analyzer that he owns on his engine. That test allowed him to analyze his problem and it gave him a PCO 03 01 error code that told him he had a defective #1 coil. The PCO 03 code told him he had a Coil problem, and the 01 told him it was with the 01 Coil. He swapped it with the #3 coil, and the problem cleared up on the #1 coil but was now in evidence on the #3 coil. He brought up this website: http://www.portholeauthority.com/ and then went to the Retrobird section, the link to which is:

http://www.portholeauthority.com/the...rd/home02.html

(if you do not know about this website, you need to bookmark it because it has great information for Retrobird owners on it).

From there he went through the Problems Page and looked at the problems that many of the Retrobird owners have experienced.

http://www.portholeauthority.com/the.../problems.html

Here he found information on various problems that Retrobird owners have experienced since these Tbirds were produced. One of them was the Coil-On-Plug ignition coils problem that he was experiencing.

http://www.portholeauthority.com/the...blems.html#top

Here is a copy of the letter that went out to 2003 Retrobird owners. The Customer Satisfaction Warranty Numbers are listed in this letter that covers this. It is my understanding that this has now been extended to 2004 & 2005 Retrobirds, as of May 20, 2008, but NOT 2002. Basically, Mike found out that Ford now covers the replacement of these Coil-On-Plugs under their 10 year or 100,000 mile warranty program, which will soon be running out, as the 10 year time is nearly out for owners of the 2005 Retrobird. It might have already run out for the 2003-2004 Retrobird owners. Something you need to check out with your Ford Dealership to see what they say.

http://www.portholeauthority.com/the...l_on_plug.html

So he contacted his local Ford dealership and took it in for service, after doing some additional research on the website above.

If you are experiencing engine missing, or rough engine problems, it might be your coils. His suggestion is that it might be a good idea to have your coils checked and replaced, if they have any problems, before the warranty runs out. He told me that he had to educate the dealership regarding the warranty on these coils, because, apparently, they did not know this warranty existed.. He also said that they changed all 8 coils and his spark plugs and it was all covered under the warranty.. Hopefully, this information will be helpful to you and save you the cost to get any problems like this fixed before the warranty runs out. There are other problems listed on the website above that might effect your Retrobird you might want to check out also.

I just found out that, IF your warranty has run out, these coils are available on Amazon for a set of 8 for less than $100. Apparently, you can replace them yourself if you have to.

[simplyconnected]

Hey did they ever get that engine computer straightened out? I remember that someone was going to talk with Bill Ford (or someone up there) about the situation. So, can they get replacement computers?

[YellowRose]

Retrobird Coil Problems

Hi Dave, I have not heard anything further regarding that problem. I will have to see what I can find out. I just talked with Rod Wake, VTCI President about this. With the passing of Bill Ford, I do not know, nor does he, if his contact was able to get anything done on this problem before Bill passed away. Rod said he will contact him again and see if there is anyone else his friend can talk to at FOMOCO. Rod did say that he has heard that there are now companies who are re-manufacturing these units and he gave me a couple of names to contact. One of them is Alan Tast. Alan, if you read this, can you provide me with the names of any companies who are now re-manufacturing these units?

[Alan H. Tast, AIA]

Hi Dave, I have not heard anything further regarding that problem. I will have to see what I can find out. I just talked with Rod Wake, VTCI President about this. With the passing of Bill Ford, I do not know, nor does he, if his contact was able to get anything done on this problem before Bill passed away. Rod said he will contact him again and see if there is anyone else his friend can talk to at FOMOCO. Rod did say that he has heard that there are now companies who are re-manufacturing these units and he gave me a couple of names to contact. One of them is Alan Tast. Alan, if you read this, can you provide me with the names of any companies who are now re-manufacturing these units?

If you're referring to the Electronic Control Module (ECM), the only company I'm aware of that may be offering refurbished units would be Cardone out of Pennsylvania, which is mentioned in the correspondence from Ray Spreen of Houston. Rod was probably thinking of me because of the article generated from Ray's and your previous comments on the topic which was placed in a recent issue of Thunderbird Scoop magazine.

As for the coil packs, I recall hearing about this issue at a couple of VTCI conventions I've been to over the past few years, but haven't gotten any direct questions or a "how-to" write-up on diagnosing/replacing them. Now I'm more convinced than ever that I'll hold off putting more electronics in my hobby cars other than a stereo and a solid-state ignition system.

[YellowRose]

Retrobird Coil Problems

Hi Alan, and thanks for the comments. Yes, it was the ECM that was referred to. So it looks like Carbone is the only company that you can get them from. I thought there might be more by now, but apparently not. I have not seen this subject addressed yet in the Scoop, but perhaps it has not come out yet. I just looked through my July/August issue and did not see it in there.

Regarding the coil problem, from what I was told by one of my club members, it was no big deal to replace each one of them. Except that one of them was hard to get to in replacing it. Another of my local club members has an engine analyzer in his garage, and when his 2005 Bird started missing, he ran his analyzer on his engine and it brought up a PCO 03 code he said, followed by a 01 code. He said that told him that his coils had a problem and it was the #1 coil. So he switched it with the #3 coil and the problem on #1 went away, but now the analyzer was showing a problem with the #3 coil. So he took his Tbird into the Ford dealership and they replaced all the coils and plugs under the warranty program, at no cost to him, as discussed in the post below.

[YellowRose]

Additional Retrobird Coil Info & Pix

My Tbird club member who brought the Retrobird coil problem to my attention sent me some additional information as to what these coils look like and another source they can be obtained from for under $100 for the set of 8.

Below are a couple of pix of what the coils look like up close, and a page on the internet of a company that sells them very cheaply. Autozone wants $60 apiece for them, which is close to what the Ford dealership will charge you if they put them in out of warranty.

http://www.1aauto.com/ignition-coil/...FRCoaQodjgcANQ

Coil pix

[YellowRose]

More Retrobird Coil Info & Pix

My Tbird club member sent me pix of the engine bay and what it looks like with these coils in place. Here are his comments.

Here's the engine pictures, first one is the drivers side, as you can see it's very hard to get to the coil cover on the left side of the picture. Second one is passenger side, the coil cover is much easier to get to except for that last bolt on the lower left. It takes a small wrench to get down there. Third picture is same view of the passenger side just a little further back. Fourth picture is more in the center of the total engine.

[simplyconnected]

Those are some mighty fine pictures of covers, Ray.
Let's see what it looks like with the covers off and why the coils fail with this YouTube video:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=0f7Jp1Jf2RU

And again, rockauto.com comes through... They want $15.47/each (not $60) for coils and don't forget the 5% discount.
STANDARD MOTOR PRODUCTS Part # FD506T T-Series
- Dave

[YellowRose]

Retrobird Coil Problems

The owner of his Retrobird did not have the time to take off the covers. It is not easy to get them off he said, in one or two areas in particular. This FD506T T-Series works on these cars.

STANDARD MOTOR PRODUCTS Part # FD506T T-Series
For:
Ford Thunderbird 2002-2005
Jaguar S-Type 1999-2003
Lincoln LS 2000-2006

Here are some more video clips.

Checking Code P0300, P0301, P0302, P0303, P0304, P0305, P0306, P0307, P0308

https://www.youtube.com/watch?annota...&v=Sg7iFytxfzQ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_7hLqC2qeHQ

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=jbJkoX_I_WM

[simplyconnected]

Ray, the covers are plastic, and of course these coils work. That's what they're made for

If your friend cannot remove plastic covers he should really seek professional help.

Did you watch the YouTube video? This kid did not solve his problem but he did find water in his coils. At least he is willing to try. His next step should be to ring out the coils with a meter to find any bad ones. Believe me, bad ones always show up. - Dave

[YellowRose]

Retrobird Coil Problems...

My club member who had this problem replaced his own coils. Here is what was said in a previous post of mine...

Regarding the coil problem, from what I was told by one of my club members, it was no big deal to replace each one of them. Except that one of the covers was hard to get off in replacing the coils.

He mentioned that it was difficult to get to one of the fasteners to get it off and it took awhile to do it. But he did get them off, changed out his coils and that took care of the problem. He did not have time to take those covers off again to get me pictures of the coils, but did find pix of them to send to me to show me what they look like. Another member took his to Ford and they did the swap out under warranty, which now probably has expired.