Intermittent Focus speedo and locks

[steve-V8s]

1999 1.6 Focus has developed two intermittent problems that seem to be connected and related to the outside temperature, colder it is the more it happens. Whilst driving the doors lock and unlock, usually at around the same time the speedo stops working, usually after 100 yards or so it comes back to life.

My guess is there is a poor earth connection somewhere at the bottom of both the faults.

Anybody got any ideas ?

[h4muf]

My door unlocks and locks when it`s cold,never happens in the summer.

`99 mondeo.

[tybo]

h4muf said:

My door unlocks and locks when it`s cold,never happens in the summer.

`99 mondeo.

Same here...on a 2000 Focus.

No problems with the speedo though.

[ChrisRS]

My locks also seem to go mental in the winter, 2001 Mondeo.

Shall we form a club??

[p3skydave]

I have a 2001 Focus and learn't my lesson the other morning.

Started car up,put on heated front/back windows and picked up ice scraper.Closes door and then after about a minute of clearing side windows,heard the dreaded noise of the central locking activating itself.

The damn thing had locked me out.Spoke to local service manager at Ford dealer and he said it "could'nt physically do that".
So people its not your car doing it,its the 'pixies'that live in your garden that are at fault.Rant over.

Regards
Dave

[steve-V8s]

Looking at other web sites the door issue seems to be a fairly common problem on Focus and Mondao. Anybody got a fix for it ?

[MikeDH]

The speedo thing used to happen to me. Never did find a cure.

[DennisTheMenace]

Is it not an earthing fault ? just check your earths and give them a clean

[andy-xr]

I'd probably go with VSS on the speedo

Doors and central locking are a mystery - my Mondeo should in theory lock itself again if the doors are unlocked but not opened. Sometimes it does, sometimes it doesnt. I think the central lockig is built into the ECU - have you got an aftermarket alarm on it?

[arebrec]

not just mine then

my 2003 Focus 2.0 locks and unlocks itself, worse on cold days.
I thought it was because my key fob has broke/batteryflat, haven't quite got round to fixing that yet.

Also when I use the key to unlock the driver door it doesn't always unlock the other doors.

nothing wrong with speedo though.

[steve-V8s]

No it doesn’t have after market alarm. Both faults sound to me like they could be earthing, there was apparently a recall for the speedo fault which is apparently a corroded connector somewhere so may be the two faults are not connected. Locking one is definitely temperature related. Anybody know where the earth for the locking system connects to the chassis ?