I have a “95” F-150 Flair Side 2WD, extended cab short bed (with bed liner and no cap) with a 302cu. in. engine. It has everything except power seat. I bought it used. It only had about 40k miles and was very clean. The sales man told me that I should be able to get about 19 mpg on the highway. If I’m lucky I might see close to 16 mpg (average speed 65 mph). I thought I’d do better.
Also if I put it on cruse control, on the highway, on a slight climb the gas pedal starts to go down, the transmission down shifts a couple of gears (while still losing speed), finally the petal goes to the floor and the truck down shifts again then roars up to speed and shifts up until it is in high gear. After getting into high gear the truck starts to slow down and the whole process starts over (I have a “90” six-cylinder mercury cougar and while on cruse control, it maintains a constant speed on the same hills).
The motor starts right up and runs smoothly. It just seems to have about as much power as a sick dog!
Help!

 

dunno man maybe ur tanny i sscrewed up! have a shop pull the codes for it. seems liek u have soem kinda tranny but maybe a fuel problem.

 

Sounds like you need to have the tranny checked.

 

Check the tranny for sure. 16 MPG isn't that bad, I would be happy if I got 16 MPG constantly on my 300.

 

Also keep in mind that little 302 is pushing more weight than that Cougar not to mention worse aerodynamics. I have always thought putting the 302 in these trucks was a mistake.

I do agree there is something else not right though. Mine will pull a hill fine as long as it's not in OD. Is it possible the cat converter(s) are getting plugged (this is one symptom)?

 

I’ve messed with vehicles for many years but this is the newest one. Don’t particularly like all of the sensors and what not, they kind of screws up a driveway mechanic. I always liked to figure out and repair most things myself. This truck makes me feel stupid!
The trans. oil doesn’t look or smell burnt.
How do you check for cat. converter problems?
Will the ford dealer’s computer be able to diagnose if it’s the trans., cat. converter or etc.

 

I had a similar problem - is your check engine light on? Might be a Vehicle Speed Sensor or bad O2 sensor. Mine was a bad o2 sensor that oil had shorted the harness from an oil pan leak.

 

your mileage seems pretty typical though. I'm lucky to get 17 on my truck.

 

No engine lights are on. The engine is pretty clean, except for road grime. There aren’t really any motor oil or trans. oil leaks. So I don’t think there are any shorts.
My speedometer is off. I put bigger tires on the back because the back wheel wells looked so empty (about two sizes bigger).
mrak, how did you know your 02 sensor was bad?

 

You just answered the "gutless" question. It takes more power to turn the bigger tires. Is your transmission elecltronic? (button for o/d on the end of the shifter) If so then the speedo controls the shift points in the transmission and the correct rpms are not being sent to the tranny.

 

good question - the truck was acting HAY-WIRE! The engine ran fine, but it took a ton of gas pedal to get the thing to accelerate / downshift. The truck would just sort of bog down until the pedal nearly the floor. Then BAM! With a huge loud clunk of the transmission straining against it's mounts and popping the frame it would downshift extremely hard and the RPM's would rocket. I think it would go from 3rd to first sometimes. A very harsh downshift which took full pedal to get it to go. The previous owner had trouble with oil leaking from the pan onto the O2 harness and shorting it out. The check engine light would come on sometimes, but not always, and the code was for the O2 sensor. Sure enough, I took it in and something was wrong with the harness. New o2 harness and it ran like a dream. Don't exactly understand why it was affecting the tranny though.
Matt

 

It is not the tires, This is my dad's truck, and it was doing this before he put the bigger tires on, and the tires arn't that much bigger. The truck can't even pull his car trailer with that truck!!!!The company I work for has a 89 1/2 ton and a 89 3/4 ton truck and they pull equipment with no problems, yeah the one has 4.10, but the other has 3.08's? and these trucks have well over 200,000 miles on them. But since I don't know anything about the computer stuff in these things, I don't know what to tell him.
no idiot lights are on, so how do you know what it's problem is.

I hope he gets it figured out, it's a good looking truck.

 

I have a 95 f 150 and this happens to my truck at times but I have 170,000 miles and I keep my truck well serviced...the cruise is controlled by the speed sensor among other sensors in the engine/air intake/ my truck only does this while climbing hills and i mean large mountain type hills. Ford Dealership has been unable to obtain why nor has any body else in this area. I do know that my computer is compensating for a stretched timing chain an I will be replacing that soon.

as for 16 miles to the gallon I have owned my day since day one and if you are still getting that be happy that is great the sticker only rated the 95 f 150 with 302 at 17mpg new. if you want better milage look at installing a K&N filter and replacing your factory exhaust with a high flow system.

back to the down shift take your truck in have the tranny sericed dump all fuilds in it and change the filter also service the diff.
run any if there are any codes.

 

It is the TIRES! the ford f150 with the 302 is a gutless pig anyway mine is hard pressed to burn a little rubber BUT when you change the rear tire diameter it throws off EVERYTHING!. The trucks computer is calabrated for a certain tire size and the truck will not shift right or run right unless you have the right size tires on the rearend. I have a 93 f 150 flairside reg cab with 77 thous original milesand it has never seen salt or snow and is near perfect. I researched about putting on larger or smaler dia tires and found out the only way you can do this is to change the speed sensor ring in the rearend and get a calabrated computer to go with the speed sensor ring for the exact dia of the rear tires. The ford trucks do surge a little when the cruse is on going up and down hills and they will kick into the next lower gear if needed going up a hill.---hope this helps you--ps i have a pacesetter high flow exaust and always have replaced all filters way before they were due and on all freeway driving with the cruise on i have only done about 16.5 (13 city) if im lucky and it has been that way since i bought it new.

 

I put a K&N air filter in last year, it might have made a slight difference in power.
The hills on the highway I’m talking about aren’t a real steep grade but are long. The truck downshifts three times. (1.) Gas pedal starts to go down as truck looses speed, torque converter unlocks (2.) Gas pedal continues to go down as truck continues to loose speed, trans. downshifts from overdrive into third gear (3.) By now the truck has lost 10+ miles per hour from cruse setting Gas pedal goes to the floor and trans downshifts into second gear, motor roars and truck races back to cruse setting, trans. up-shifts into overdrive and converter locks in. After this, the whole process starts over again.
I went from a P235x75R 15 to a 31x10.5R 15. I don’t know the difference in the circumference between the two sizes and I do realize that the size change will do something but what I’m saying is “This was happening before I put the bigger tires on the back.”
This is the first late model computerized V-8 vehicle I’ve owned and I'm not sure what to expect. On the older trucks when you pushed the accelerator down you could feel something happening. On this 95 F-150 it is almost like the accelerator pedal isn’t hooked to the throttle, it is like when you push the accelerator pedal the computer flips a coin to decide if and how fast you should accelerate. I don’t understand this nor do I like it!