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T-Bird Radio

  • Thread starter Thread starter sirchaz
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Just got the T-Bird back from the Dealer Service Department. They replaced the radio. Was getting a lot static and bleed on AM. They put in the new radio the same problem was there. Service manager told me they contacted Ford Motor Company Engineers and were informed that FORD was aware of the problem that
it is caused by the wire harness and they are trying to come up with a fix but do not have one as yet. Then I just got this message from a friend of a FMC Engineer.

The only concern that I am aware of is noise on AM. I will describe the history as I know it. The noise
in AM has been described as a ticking or chirping, and the NOVA auditor described it as a ticker tape machine. The source of the noise is the SCP wires (to REM and RKE) that route across the car on the top of the cowl,
just below the top IP surface. Due to the location of the antenna, on the windshield, the noise radiating from the SCP wires is picked up by the
antenna and results in noise in AM.
This was found at FEU-2 by the NOVA Auditor. Cars were tested in the EMC lab and the resulting fix was to shield the SCP wires that cross the car along
the top of the cowl. The fix was implemented in two phases. The first phase was for the existing 14A005 wire harnesses were modified to add an overlay
harness that contained the shielded SCP wires. The second phase was incorporation of the shield in production harnesses. My understanding was
that there were about 1000 14A005s that were reworked. The first phase was implemented on the Constrained Build, after the first 13 CB cars had been
built. I was contacted by our resident at Wixom about a early complaint about AM noise that came in through the FCSD Hotline. I worked with the dealer and we
couldn't find anything wrong with the car (missed ground, pinched wire, bad coax, etc.). I revisited the SCP noise that was found at FEU-2 The original recommendation was to change the wire routing, but as
this was common with the LS he had to accept the next best thing which was to add the shielding to the SCP wires. I further reviewed the wire routing
in the car and developed a reroute, that could be a potential service fix,
to reroute the SCP wires down the left side of the car and then across to the REM and RKE. This reroute keeps the SCP wires from crossing the car under the antenna, keeping the source of the noise away from the antenna. I got an overlay harness used to rework the 14A005s from Siemens and installed it in a Wixom PVT car using the revised routing. We tested it in
the EMC lab and proved that it is effective.
sirchaz

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What an excellent post. Thank you sirchaz. Gives me more confidence that by the eime Mom's red bird comes in, most issues will be identified and corrected.
 
Thanks for the post. Excellent info. I had noticed the noise on the radio on both my cars and had not been able to determine its source. I am a broadcaster and one of my stations is broadcasting in AM Stereo. We are particularly pleased at the fidelity and when people hear it on a great quality receiver like Ford has in the Thunderbird (which has an AM Stereo receiver) they are amazed. Many say it is better than FM.
The only negative I had noticed was that on a weak signal there was a noise present. Now, thanks to you, I know its source.
 
What assurances do we have that Ford will incorporate the fix into the production line cars in a timely manner? It would be nice to know where at in the vin sequence this fix takes place.. Still no vin yet; was 7 of 13 at dealer, however, due to stock units, am now 9 of 13. Blue/Blue/Premium. Dealer has received 6 units thus far.

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Glad I could be of help. Drove the Bird to Sarasota a month ago and it was a great ride. Got a lot of questions from people. Will be driving it back to NoVa this easter.
 
Speaking of radio problems, here's one I've been having, and it might be the same thing.

On AM, I can often hear one station quite clearly while supposedly being tuned to another. For example, when driving in Los Angeles, if I set the radio to 790 AM, I can clearly hear 640 AM at a lower level. If I change the setting to 640, though, I don't hear any interference from 790. There are several pairs of stations like this which I've found in L.A. and San Diego, and the problem is always in one direction only (interference from 1-2, but not 2-1). I haven't contacted a dealer about it, as I still haven't decided who I'll use for service (just NOT the dealer I bought it from).
 
Leonk, we are having some trouble with 6 CD players in our Goldwings also. Mine is fine.
Just want to suggest that you only use CD's with no labels on them. Ones you copy are find just so you don't add the paper labels.
 
Sirchaz, I find this post very interesting, my wife and I have not had a problem with ours yet, so we'll keep our fingers crossed.

There is also a MD T-Bird group, the address is http://groups.*********/group/md_tbird it's for T-Bird owners of MD, VA, DC, and PA. There will be some things coming up this spring.
 
biggrin.gif
Atcoles, hope you and others in our area keep an eye on the yahoo MD. site. We are trying to setup a spring drive for this area eather through MATC or just new 02 Birds. Doesn't matter eather way. Hope you can come when we get it set up.

If you know any plans that I haven't heard about let me know.

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02 T-Bird 9293
69 Vette
73 MGB
97 F-150 4x4
2-Seadoo Jet Skies
a dog a cat and a couple hundred fish in my pond

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Jeliotb,

Traveled through North Orange County and got the exact same condition you described, tune to 790 and can hear 640 in the background. Went to riverside County and did NOT hear 640 in the background. Don't know if the problem is the radio or the station thouigh.
 
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