Yeah, the thought crossed my mind. Thanks; it's good advice. Only problem is, if it happens again in the next month or so, before I swap that solenoid, I want to take it back to them with the $350 bill in hand . Or do I ....

 

$350 for diags of the problem, the solenoid itself, "shop supplies for repair order," a brake light I stupidly approved over the phone, $223.99 in labor.

Yes, I'm ticked. The worst part, though, is Ford admitting the TSB applied to my truck, but siding with the dealer that the part they put on was the required part. It has no shield. What can I do?

 

I just bought the new solenoid with the shield, it was 23 bucks, funny thing is if u dont get the one with the shield its like 45 bucks, go figure!

 

XJ, is this the hose you said to disconnect if you run into problems and want to keep the IWE locked in? If so, which end would you disconnect ? I was thinking the bigger hose on the engine side. If a guy was in a pinch would it work to fold the hose over and wrapping it with duct tape or clamping it with a vice grip?


How common is it to have this problem, I have an '05 with 48,000 on it and haven't had any problems yet. I bought the truck new and built a rainshield for the iwe solenoid about a year after buying the truck, since I figured that was about the only thing that would cause problems, but it seems now that the solenoid going bad is minor compaired to all the other things that seem to be causing problems. I love my truck, but am starting to consider selling it and getting a super duty with a manual system so I don't have to worry about something going wrong with this complicated system.

 

That plastic peice connecting the hard tiny hose to the big rubber hose is a check valve, there are two of them, that one and i think there is one behind the battery, check those to see if they are still checking correctly, if they are not it will allow the vacuum in the IWE system to fluctuate with the vacuum coming from the engine, and at high RPMs it can drop to far and allow the IWE actuators to try and engage.

Back to your question in the picture you have you finger on the check valve, you can disconnect the hose on the right side of the check valve, that one comes from the engine. Make sure you plug it off cause if not it will just suck air and might make your engine not run right, but what it will do is not feed vacuum to the system and the system will act like the 4wd is engaged (at the wheels) but it wont, cause you dont have the tranfer case switched. Got it?

On another note, yesterday i was driving with the windows down and i was going up a hill and in high RPMs and i could hear real quick the driver side IWE trying to engage and my stomach just dropped from hearing that after i did all that work on mine a year ago. So anyway, i got home today and grabbed the vacuum guage and started checking everything, actuators checked fine, vacuum at each wheel checked fine, and what i found was when i replaced the check valves i used a three way valve and just plugged off the extra port, well the plug dry rotted and had a crack in it and was letting the vaccum out just enough that is was ok when in lower RPMs, but let the whole system drop when in high RPMs, thank god that was it, after all i did with the system before i was thinking about just driving it off a cliff if i had to mess with the whole system again. So here are a couple pictures the check valve. I put a new better plug on it and it held vacuum, so im good for now!





Pics are a little blurry, but you get the idea.

 

thanks XJ, I don't have any problems right now but I wanted to find out what to do if I run into a problem while on the road. I was originally going to pull the vac hoses off each wheel end and tape them shut, but this looks like an easier and quicker temp fix.

 

Ya that is deffinately easier and it cuts the vacuum to the whole system right there. After i thought about it you could also unplug the hose on the left side of the check valve and use a rubber cover plug on the check valve, instead of unplugging the hose on the right side and sticking something in it to plug it.

 

Im a newby here, I have a 05 f150 screw 4x4 and there is a chain type of noise when I give it gas in 2wd, I can shift to N and it goes away, when it is in 4wd the noise is also not heard. Any thoughts????

 

Get a good vacuum guage, and start at the beginning of the thread and test your system, its the only way to acurrately pin point you problem.

 

Thanks for the explanation, now I clearly understand why my truck was pulling to a side after using the 4x4. Back then i thought I had bent something in the front end.

 

I thought I had it all figured out. Last winter my 4X4 took a dump on me. I followed the directions from this post and was able to fix it with replacing the solenoid on the firewall with the new one with the rainguard. It worked perfectly for a few months. Recently I started having problems getting it to engage and now it will not engage at all. When front is jacked off the ground and engine off the the hubs will engage and with the engine started they disengauge as they should. When I switch to 4X4 hi or lo the light comes on but no 4X4. Could the new solenoid be defective? or is there something else I should look at. Thanks for any help ya'll might be able to give.

 

It could possibly be the switch motor on the transfer case, these are known to hang up. Crawl under the truck and give it a couple good wacks with a rubber mallet, and see if that frees it up. If that is not the problem, get a vaccum guage and check the vaccum coming off the solenoid when switching to 4wd and back. See if its actually working correctly off the 4wd switch.

 

Hello all. New to this forum but having the same issue as everyone else with the IWE. One catch though that I haven't found an answer for. Mine was intermittent and predominantly only in the AM.

Bottom line up front, I have constant vacuum from the engine (~26 hg) and just replaced the solenoid. Problem remains. So, I checked the solenoid and its good. Then, I hooked up a test light to the circuit going to the solenoid and drove around a while. Occationally, the light goes out, vacuum drops to zero and grinding begins . A few seconds later, light comes on, vacuum comes up and noise stops (old solenoid was good too turns out). My problem is the power to the solenoid is intermittent. Also discoverred its on the same circuit as the AC clutch.

Anyway, fuse is good but for some reason the power to the solenoid occationally turns off (then back on a few seconds later).

Any ideas??

BTW 2006 F150 Lariat Crew 4X4 w/6" lift

Thanks in advance.

 

Ok, still looking for some help. Went ahead and replaced the actuators (one was bad and stayed engaged all the time) turns out it was broken in half. Anyway the primary problem remains. Occational grinding caused by power to solenoid being cut.

So, I bypassed the solenoid by connecting the vacuum lines direct; which effectively means I'll have to reconnect it for 4WD.

At any rate, I still have the problem. Does anyone have a wiring diagram for this? Would be very appreciated...

 

Two things I would check. If you have the 4wd selector switch on the dash pull it and make sure the power is making it through the switch correctly or incorrectly. Second check the shift motor on the transfer case to see if it is not working correctly and maybe switching. Sorry I don't hae a wiring diagram but these would be some easy things to check