Lincoln LS: Problems & Solutions
schneider11
Member Posts: 4
My 2000 Lincoln has 110,000 miles and has overheated 5 times in the last 30 days. I have taken it in all times and the mechanics cannot figure it out. It does not happen all the time. In other words when I take it in, it does not overheat, but after driving it a few days, boom, it happens again. The computer show nothing, the thermostat has been replaced, the lines have been bleed, radiator cleaned,,,and so on. Anyone have any ideas?
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It may be that none of this will apply to your car, but it might. It sure had me scratching my head for a while. Leave the A/C on all the time and see if the car still overheats.
BTW: Mine never did set the check engine light.
What you need to do is this---when the car starts to overheat, pull over and see if the cooling fan is running or not.
If it IS running, and you've done all you've said you've done, I'd do a pressure test and look for a head gasket leak-- which can also in rare cases be a variable.
Dealer replaced the thermostat and everything has been fine since.
jaffo: A hydraulic cooling fan???? I've been under the hood of my sister-in-law's LS, and granted I wasn't closely studying the fan, but I'd bet you an expensive steak dinner it's electric.
The there was a period of time when Ford was getting bad hydraulic fan motors. This problem held up early shipments of the T-Bird as well as LS's for a while. Before any of you start bashing American and Ford quality, the hydraulic fan motors are made in Germany.
In 2003 the LS switched to an electic fan motor. I'm guessing that they could do this because the heated seats are no longer the electric heater wire type.
Seems to be hydraulic drilling or spinning would be a very mushy, non-direct affair.
Guess I need to take a few of these apart and see what's what.
Two key advantages of hydraulics are:
1. The power source can by remotely located and can deliver more power to a remote location that has a lightweight power head.
2. Should a hydraulic motor stall, there is less chance of damage, such as broken cables, gears etc.
The best way I can think how to explain the advantage of hydraulics, is to think of pnumatic power tools and how well they work. They work on air, which is compressible. Now imagine how much more power could be delivered to the too with a no compressible liquid.
sounds quite european, designers mad with power forcing managing directors to mop up the test lab, etc... and that's got to be a $150 motor at least, not including the pressure hoses, replacing what at retail is a $35 DC motor on your traditional FWD cooling fan.
also a good way to hose up PS pumps over time. just put a goldarn bigger alternator in, geez. that level of detail and precision to move air across a radiator is absolute overkill and expensive.
oh... the atomic bomb revealed that all matter is compressible under sufficient heat and pressure. it's just that you need shaped charges or a critical mass plus of nuclear fuel to get that much.
Now as swschrad described, the tolerances are much closer allowing very little leakage past the impeller. Have you ever driven a hydrostatic riding mower? That is a hydraulic drive system. To test the "mushiness" of this type system, take off either in forward or reverse and slam the pedal or lever into the other direction. The mower will either break traction and spin the tires while going the opposite direction, or it will snap your neck and immediately reverse direction. And as mentioned above, if you happen to overload one, there are usually check valves designed to relieve pressure on the drive system should the change in direction be too sudden.
Most all of the zero-turn radius mowers you see are hydraulicly driven.
But, as I said earlier. I cannot wait until Sunday afternoon to get a look at this system. It just boggles my mind, which may not be hard to do, why Ford would spend that much money to engineer something this way!
However, applying this principle to an automotive cooling fan, one wonders why one would take a simple thing that works so well and make it more complicated? I'm wondering what the engineers thought the advantage was. I mean, a motor takes power to operate, too. Maybe they wanted something super-quiet?
I'm wondering if this type of cooling fan could be motor-oil driven, since it sounds like the hydraulic fluid is only used as a "pusher" and doesn't need to be hydraulic fluid at all.
maybe it makes for a smaller motor to use a hydraulic. but such a cost.
I would guess hydraulics are more efficient then converting mechanical motion into electricity by alternator and then back into mechanical motion by a fan motor -- hydraulics does not waste energy, except by fricition, but there must be a strong reason to replace cheap electric motors with bearings, valves, fluid, and pipes.
I am told the Jag S type of the same year (with pretty much the same engine and chassis) had an electric fan.
By the way....2003 and up have electric fans.
I'll try to make it a point to check one out sometime and see it in operation. Thanks for the info everybody.
Electric fans are hard to speed control [on/off/at best high low] vs engine speed vs air speed [mph].......see this on V8 mostly due to extra heat output.....very reliable have seen SC400 with 300,000 miles if the PS fluid was changed.
Really hard to get a reliable >110-120 amp alternator unless water cooled [BMW/MB].
The LS was the first FoMoCo vehicle designed to their new 150,000 mile durability specifications.
The LS is build so solid, 200K will not be a problem for any LS that is well maintained. If you read the LS forums on Edmunds and elsewhere you will see that there are a good number of LS's that already have over 100,000 miles. Two LS owners I know are around 120,000 miles with them running strong at this point.
Another possible cause: If the coolant was ever drained, there is a specific process for refilling that must be followed to the letter. If not, large air bubbles can be trapped in the system and cause overheating.
Here's another way to get good cooling:
http://www.msnbc.com/news/960457.asp?0dm=C16OT
I just wonder if the paint is re-entry heat resistant, though
Better way is dual radiators in the rear quarter panel air scoops.
schneider11: Have you ever found out what was the problem?
Making some assumptions here: You trust the mechanic has the proper knowledge, skills and tools to do the job. The power steering pump is working properly as well as the solenoid and valves connected to the fan, fan also. So air flow is not the problem. There are no air pockets anywhere in the coolant. If there are, then that could cause your problem. The water pump and T-stat has been checked and are working properly. There are no kinks in any of the radiator or heater core hoses to impede flow. Nothing has been dropped into the radiator or engine, such as the foil seal off the anti-freeze bottle, that could block key passages.
If the problem is a "happens one minute, then not happen again for several days" sort of thing with all other variables being the same, such as driving styles, conditions and temps, then the problem would almost have to be electrical. Has the mechanic been able to reproduce the problem? If he has, did he physically check to make sure the engine was ACTUALLY overheating? You mentioned a new processor, did you mean PCM? That leads me to think that maybe the car really isn't overheating, but only thinks it is. I can see where a bad temp. sensor or PCM could create the scenario you describe.
As it has been revealed earlier, I'm no expert here, just a shadetree trying to help. You've got one of those problems that will drive you nuts trying to find it. Good luck.
That happened to my 2000 LS V-8 (along with a host of other problems, including a sticking thermostat).
I've never heard of it -- but if the sensors on the engine communicate through the same bus -- the problem, if electrical, could be almost anywhere -- including (and especially) the shaky grounding path from the rear of the car (aluminium sub-chassis) to the front, where the CPU and alternator is located.
Bottom line- intermittant electrical problems are a real bear for even experienced LS mechanics to diagnose.
the way it's done on a car electrical bus should be, disconnect all connectors after pulling the battery cable, clean up anything that needs it, put a thin coat of dielectric grease or CAIG De-Ox-It on each connector face, skim the O-rings with dielectric grease, connect/disconnect several times and then put 'em together to stay and move on to the next connector.
if anything looks burned up, you have to get appropriate connector rebuild parts and fix it.
common busses suck from a repair perspective. I much more like switched connections, in which separate runs to each geegaw end up in a master connections box that electrically kicks signals where needed when needed. very little fails there, and it only affects the nutty branch when it does. don't suppose this equivalent of the $19.95 ethernet switch has made it into cars yet.
I think if I had had a 500 gallon cooling system it would have eventually boiled, given enough time.
I just changed my thermostat today on my 2000 Lincoln LS. I'm having the same problem as the origional post (overheating occasionally). Last time it overheated, I checked the "hydrolic fan" and it was screaming. I replaced the thermostat without purging the system and it overheated again. I then purged it and drove it hard for amout a mile and no problems yet.
Bullet 01, I read you post before replaceing my thermostat. It appearst I have the same setup as you do "ALLEN WRENCH TYPE COVER" <- I fugure that is the the purge cap. Below that is the thermostat. If it the same setup as my car, you will find the t-stat running to the lower radiator connection, not the upper. (PS - dont use all caps in your next post, it's hard to read)
Now I need to let off some steam. The dealership wanted to charge me $500 to replace an o2 sensor and a T-stat. The parts cost me $56 ($11 T-stat, $45 O2 sensor) I'm not a mechanic and it took me 10 minutes to replace the sensor and a hour to replace the T-stat (including the time spent doing a test drive, running up to store for advice and antifreaze, purging the system and doing another test run).
I'm going to keep reading and posting because I suspect that the thermostat isn't the cause.
Captain, if you've successfully purged the LS cooling system, you're a better mechanic than you know, or maybe a bit lucky, because it's very difficult NOT to get air trapped in the system, which causes overheating. We've seen this enough times in our owner's club that most of us recommend biting the bullet and paying a dealership the $80 or so they charge to service the cooling system. Congratulations.
We seem to be having the same problem. I just noticed that when the car temp starts climbing, turning on the heat for about 30 seconds makes everything fine the rest of trip. As mentioned earlier, there probably is an air pocket. I'm suspecting that by turning on the heat and opening the heater core passage, the air pocket is moved to a nonharmful location.