So..... what's the word?

Who would have thought 4 years later some virus would keep this from finally happening.

hammyt wrote:

Who would have thought 4 years later some virus would keep this from finally happening.

A few things have come up in the meantime that I did not anticipate...that's for sure.

This will finish up around the same time Project Binky does....

Curious what he has lined up if the van is not ready.

should've known this was coming...

The replacement for the 9-2x is actually an older car - a 2001 9-5 Aero (5MT of course) that I convinced a friend to buy a couple of years ago. If he hadn't bought it at the time, I may have. Now he's moving on, so I'm going to buy it from him. It's in incredible shape and has about 64k miles on it. The thinking was that after 8+ years of owning the 9-2x I just wasn't really that excited about driving it. I needed something new, and the 9-5 being offered tipped me over the edge. It's a super fun car to drive and very comfortable. It has ventilated seats! From 2001!

Over the winter I got a new job and got a little hiring bonus. I bought a 2001 Isuzu Rodeo (6cyl, manual) with 120k miles on it for $2,500 as a self-reward. We use it for camping/off-roading type stuff, and it will be my foul-weather vehicle. That was actually another thing that made me start thinking about replacing the 9-2x. I got so much joy out of just having a new-to-me vehicle, learning about it, fixing it, modifying it, making it better...it made me think that maybe it was time to let go of the 9-2x and get a new daily-driver that would be something exciting and interesting. I've had a ton of fun fixing it up; very rewarding.

Also, my wife is pregnant. As has been the case many times over the last few years with various milestones that seem way off in the distance, it's an insane idea that the van still wouldn't be done before the kid arrives (January), but we have to learn from the past. It's a real possibility. I know a lot of folks have daily'd a 9-2x with a car seat in the back, but we tried putting one back there and it was just a bit too tight to be comfortable up front. I'm about 5'10" and just a couple more inches of extra space in the back would have made a big difference. The 9-5 is a much bigger car and will fit a car seat in the back much better. It's over a foot longer (not all that translates to leg room because the trunk is cavernous, but it is significant), which was surprising to me until I saw it in my garage - the thing is a big ass car.

So, I'll drive that until the van is done.

Since this is the van thread, I guess I'll give a status while I'm at it and you guys are asking. The holdup is still ECU/electronics-based. I'll spare some of the details, but we've started narrowing in on the cause of the ECU woes. It used to run/drive and it was awesome. The only issue was all the error lights on the dash, which were supposedly going to be fixed by the dealer reprogramming the ECU. That didn't happen. Somehow, what did happen is something I had suspected for a while but couldn't confirm until now. What happened was the dealer reflashed the ECU into thinking it was a Transit Connect (even though it is the FoST ECU). Also, somehow it was able to drive back from the dealer after that happened (maybe didn't re-set all the engine parameters?). And eventually it wouldn't start. It makes sense that the ECU, thinking it is an Transit Connect, can't start a FoST engine. The difference is a 2.5L n/a port-injected engine vs. a 2.0L turbo direct-injected engine, for starters.

The Ford dealer has basically admitted that they screwed it up. Now it's a matter of how to get it back to how it was, running/driving. We sent the ECU out to a 3rd party company to re-flash it to being the 2014 FoST (without any updates or whatever Ford corporate may have issued that could also screw things up). We got it back and it was still using the TC ROM ID. So, whatever they did, they didn't do it right. And that's kinda where it sits. A new ECU might be an option, but I'm concerned about dealing with a 3rd VIN. At this point, whatever will get the thing running, I'll take.

dotmaster206 wrote:

The Ford dealer has basically admitted that they screwed it up. Now it's a matter of how to get it back to how it was, running/driving. We sent the ECU out to a 3rd party company to re-flash it to being the 2014 FoST (without any updates or whatever Ford corporate may have issued that could also screw things up). We got it back and it was still using the TC ROM ID. So, whatever they did, they didn't do it right. And that's kinda where it sits. A new ECU might be an option, but I'm concerned about dealing with a 3rd VIN. At this point, whatever will get the thing running, I'll take.

That dealer should be able to use the VIN from the original Focus and reflash the ECU with IDS and be done with it to at least get it back to where it was.

It's very difficult, if not impossible, for manufacturers to change the entire network topology as part of a ECU flash because it will break communications with all sorts of other modules in the car.  Which is to say, the chances of having problems due to an update from Ford seems pretty low.

Does it key on at all?  I kind of wonder if the anti-theft system is immobilizing it after the dealer (most likely) blew away the security keys.

And congrats on the coming expansion to your family!

hrm, sounds like you need a sacrificial ST you can plug the PCM into.

This is likely a dumb question, but that's usually not much of a deterrent for me...

Could you temporarily swap out the body control module with one from a donor car and any other modules that could be affected during PCM reprogramming to preserve their current programming and then swap them back after the PCM is done?

Last edited by Rich-N-AZ (2020-09-10 19:49:34)

May or may not be off topic, but who was the dude who had that school bus project?

Yup: https://www.saab92x.com/viewtopic.php?id=79306&p=1

Not a school bus though - looked like an airport shuttle type bus.

Oh my bad. A natural progression to go from a bus to a BUS I suppose.

Yep, I remember now.

racerjim wrote:

Pretty sure that was Hyperboarder; he hasn't been around for a while