hello!
I need trim/interior parts for my new 1997 Aerostar 4.0 XLT. Tan interior.

if anybody has the following or know a source for salvage parts, please let me know:

1) shifter arm's End Cap, the round black plastic finisher cap at the end of the shifter arm with a hole in the center for the overdrive button. 5-speed automatic.

2) license plate lights, undamaged and clear. Mine are cracked and foggy.

3) Antenna assembly with cable, the complete assembly including cable and rubber grommet.

4) Rear hatch window interior plastic surround, Tan, undamaged.

5) driver's door panel, Tan, complete and undamaged with working door lock switches, window switches, switch's Tan plastic panel and mirrors switch. Must be like new.

6) factory Equalizer unit that mounts underneath Radio complete with uncut wiring harness and including mounting hardware.

Thanks for any help.

 

ignore numbers 1, 2, 3, and 4 . I found those. Still looking for numbers 5 and 6.

 

JOSE A I LIKE TO THANKS YOU FOR YOU INF W/ THE ALTERNATOR AND ALSO LET YOU KNOW IN THAT PLACE WHERE YOU PULL YOUR PARTS THEY HAVE SO MANY THAT IS CASE IN NEW ORLEANS, BATON ROUGE FORD AEROSTAR 1997 JOSE M VINDEL

 

Jose,
you welcome!

 

To keep the shifter cap from falling off, put a small dap of black RTV on the tabs. It will hold it on, yet if you really need to remove it, a small amount of pressure will loosen it. you only need a small dab, and on only one tab.

The factory equalizer is really not any good. I would opt for a better radio instead. Either way, you need new wire to the speakers because the stock system uses a common ground setup that sounds like crap. Even with stock speakers, if you can run dedicated grounds the sound quality will improve dramatically.

 

what I did was, I went around and pulled a bunch of the O.D. caps from a bunch of Aerostar and Windstars, so I will never lose one again. I even pulled the O.D. switches!
$ .50 cents each.

I understand the Ford sound system is crap. I've owned Aerostars since 1986. What I don't understand is how is it possible that the sound system in my Jaguar XJ-6 sounds so good with four small 5.25" speakers, one per door. The Bass is incredible at all volume levels. And the car still has the original factory radio cassette.

and then the Aerostar sounds so bad with two 6 x 9 speakers and two 4" dash speakers which I never use because they sound so bad. I thought the EQ would improve the lows and highs and mids.

 

Were the speakers in your Jag stock, or aftermarket? I found that even cheap aftermarket speakers can sound better than Ford's "premium" speakers, especially of those vintage.

The problem with the common ground is that you can't use it with most aftermarket amplifiers. Most of them use active amplifiers on both speaker wires to give you more than the 36 watts per channel output that a single-ended amplifier can give you with 12 volts input and 4 ohm speakers. If you connect those dual-line amplifiers to the stock wiring, you will short out half of the amplifier to ground, which not only makes it sound bad, but will burn it out eventually.

I have a stock equalizer in my van, and I use it a lot on talk shows where some speakers' voices just resonate badly with the Aerostar's interior. I've found the couple of bands to knock down specifically, but some times my passengers like to play with it and throw off my settings. So IF I ever get a fancy audio system, I will get one of those equalizers that require small screwdrivers to set the levels of each band, find a pattern to compensate for the interior, and then hide it so no one can mess with it.

 

xlt4wd90

yes, the four speakers in my '84 XJ are the originals. They were made by AIWA and so was the radio, but of course the cassette door says "Jaguar".

I don't know how the Jag system is wired, common ground or not, does that make a difference? could that be the difference in sound quality? it does sound like a high-fi home system, and there's plenty of power if you like it loud, which I do. I am also a working musician (guitarist, bassist, keyboardist) since the 1960's, so I should know about sound).

today I checked the Aerostar speakers and they appear to be the originals. I remember installing Pioneer 6 x 9 three-way speakers in my '92 Aerostar and they sucked, I actually thought the old Ford speakers sounded better, so I know exactly what you are saying.

 

I'm willing to bet that Jaguar sourced better speakers than Ford did, and they probably did more tuning in the XJ than Ford did in the Aero. The interior of the Aerostar is full of odd resonances, so they need to be dampened or equalized to get a flat response. Otherwise, no speaker will sound good.

 

Common ground makes a huge difference, absolutely.

When they label a speaker as + and - its kinda misleading, because speakers vibrate, in some ways they behave like AC current, it the changes in current that cause the speakers to vibrate and produce sound.

In the stock Aerostar system the amplifier drives one side of the speakers only. So if you are driving one side, hooking all the - sides together works ok. However, you still get a feedback effect that causes distortion at higher power levels.

Most aftermarket systems use a loop driver that basically drives both the + and - lines of each speaker isolated from all the other channels. This allows higher wattage outputs, and more sound per watt. Some will also use dual independent drivers, one on the + and the other on the - line.

When you connect a standard aftermarket stereo to a common ground, it causes severe distortion, and as pointed out, it can damage the drivers.

The solution is to run new wires to each speaker. You can keep the stock stereo plugs, but disconnect the stock speaker wire, and replace it with new wire. This will isolate each speaker front he common ground, and even with a stock radio and speakers, the sound quality will improve.

That being said, stock Aerostar speakers are very shoddy.

The sound system I have in my van is incredible. Admittedly, mine is over the top, but it does show that you can get excellent sound quality in an Aerostar.

Addressing the resonances that Aerostars produce, much of this has to do with panels and chambers resonating at certain frequencies. This can be fixed. On my van, I used a product called roadkill. It is a metal lined rubber adhesive panel which you adhere to the metal surfaces inside the roods and such. It will reflect sound, but it also cancels out vibration in the panels. It cuts down on wind and road noise, and helps stop the vibration and resonance from the stereo from inside. It has the same effect as increasing wattage, because you don't have to turn the stereo up to overcome the ambient noises so much. To do both doors and the slider door, you need two trunk kits.

This may still seem expensive, but it will make whatever sound system you already have sound much much better. Plus cutting down on road noise is always nice.

There are other approaches you could take for a similar effect that might be cheaper.

 

so the Aerostar is wired common ground ?

I know about insulation, the front doors in the Aerostar need it badly, they have nothing behind the door skin, it resonates horribly hollow when you close the door. Also there is no insulation (whatever the material) on the rear inner panels behind the speakers, on the sliding door, or the hatch door. There is some insulation on the floor below the carpet.

Funny you would mention resonances and vibrations; I read an article where William Lyons, head of Jaguar, took one of the first XJ prototypes in 1968 and pointed to the resonances which needed damping. A Jaguar joke is that part of the weight of these cars is the amount of insulation behind every panel. They used a material that looks like tar sheets, self sticking, looks like pegboard, applied to every interior panel, then the entire area was painted including the insulation panel. These cars are very quiet at highway speeds.

Talking about wiring: I'm replacing the rear hatch area unswitched Dome lamp; I installed one that has the 3-position rocker switch DOOR-ON-OFF. This switched lamp has three wires, the one I removed has two.

Two wires match (Black, and Black with Blue stripe, so the lamp works in the DOOR and OFF positions. The third wire, Green with Yellow stripe, I can't find how or where to connect it to make the ON position work, which assumedly works when the hatch door is closed.

does the Ignition Switch need to be ON for this Green/Yellow wire to work?

 

Don't you have to run a new +12v wire to make that work? The rear light is switched of the front ones, so unless the front ones are switched on, the rear one probably won't light up in the on position. You need a new 12+ power source directly to that light, fused of course.

So if I understand you correctly, the light you are installing has a green/yellow, but the van does not, or is it the other way around?

 

yes, the harness in the van does not seem to have the Green/Yellow wire, unless it is taped/defeated inside the rest of the harness. The dome lamp I am trying to install comes with three wires, (the third wire is the Green/Yellow wire), but the dome lamp I removed has only two wires, Black, and Black with Blue stripe.

Yuk, if I have to run a new wire the headliner has to come out!

 

> Yuk, if I have to run a new wire the headliner has to come out!

That's a great time to add insulation.

One of the reason the higher end luxury cars weigh so much is because of all their sound-deadening materials. I remember an article I read about the Lexus sedans actually being built with dual-layer sheet metal that sandwiched those asphalt-like sheets, and even their exhaust pipes we double-layered. Other companies. like Buick, boasts of how the rigidity of their body structure increases its natural resonance frequency to ranges that are less annoying or more easily absorbed by upholstery.

So if you're willing, you can do something similar to the Aerostar by installing stiffening ribs in those long expanses of panels, either by seam welding or structural adhesive, and stick those asphalt sheets in between the ribs. And use uneven spacing between the ribs to minimize resonance at the new frequencies. Of course this is going to add weight to an already heavy car.

 

where do you get those asphalt sheets? All I can find is the Road Kill or Dynamat, but I don't want the aluminum stuff. I thought the asphalt sheets was old technology, even my '65 Jag's interior is covered in the asphalt sheets too. (not to mention caulking, Jaguar used a lot of caulking too, sandwiched between the exterior panels and the inner panels, this caulking is easy to see in the Aerostar too. I'm not complaining!

Ok, I'm now removing the rear side panels to be able to lower the headliner, already got the passenger side out. Working in the driver's side panel now.

I found a Courtesy Lamp Wiring diagram for the 1997 Aerostar and it shows the Green/Yellow wire is hot all the time, leading to the battery, and it runs to and from most all electrical components. The diagram tells me the wire is there in the back so I'm going to find it and finish the rear dome lamp install by tomorrow. It also tells me there is wiring for [OPTIONAL] DOME LAMP over the first rear seat?? or for Cargo Vans?? Another project! The headliner is coming down.