Cooling system

[Traci818]

oh oh

Car ran very smoothly for almost a month and now... it feels like the coils are misbehaving again... running rough, feels like it's in the wrong gear... loses power and has trouble making it up hills. not sure if that's what it is... either way something's wrong. No engine light on just a shakey car... 🙁

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[George]

Traci:
That certainly sounds like COPS failure to me. I believe you have a 2003. If so, you should have received a letter about 6 months ago extending your warranty (ON COPS ONLY) up to 100,000 miles. So you should drop it off on them again. Be sure to have them write up the service order that says what you are experiencing.
If you are unsure of your dealer, see if there is a Lincoln dealer close by. The Lincoln LS cars have had real issues with COPS as well and that dealer may be more familaiar with the problem - There are so few TBirds the Ford dealers, for the most part, don't have a clue.

 

[George]

Traci818:

Any more on your problems? I'd be interested on what they did for you and how the Bird runs now.

 

[Traci818]

Are Coils COPS?

The coils were again soaked with oil. This is the second time I've had this repair done. It ran ok for a while but is still rough so I'm taking it back in again. Not sure they know what they are doing and how to fix it...

Is there something I should be telling them to do other than replace the coils and plugs?

 

[George]

Yes, so far everyone that has had oil soaked COPS has had to have their valve cover gaskets replaced. That's where the oil is coming from. Hope this helps

 

[dchamb]

I read the posts on the overheating issues with tbirds, and can't help commenting as to the similarity to a Taurus I once owned. The temp was up and down and mostly up, and many mechanics tried various remedies, none of which worked. I never solved the problem, so I can't pretend to have any answers, but I do have a couple of observations; 1-very small radiator, 2-(this ones really a question) why does a car need a fan going 60 miles an hr.? A fan doesn't produce that much air flow, and seems to me if its running, would actually block off much of the air flow generated by highway speed air flow. Used to be, fans were on a clutch which had the fan run in slow traffic and go off at highway speed. I guess that was to successful a system and had to be changed.