I recently had the battery changed in my 04 Mountaineer. I read the manual and went through the computer reset precedures but it still drives like crap and tries to stall out which it NEVER used to do. This is the second battery that I have put in this vehicle and the first time i went through the procedures and all worked fine. If I wanted to unhook the battery and start over with the setup how long should I leave it unhooked for the computer to reset also should i put the positive or negative cable on first or does it matter?

 

I think it takes 20 min. to drain all power from the system. Hook the neg. cable up last, disconnect it first.

 

The computer resetting is likely your problem. The computer 'learns' your driving habits over time. Since you've disconnected the battery, it doesn't have a completed drive cycle and the computer hasn't compensated for your driving style. You don't want to disconnect the battery to remedy this, you want to leave it connected and drive it. If it doesn't get better after 25 miles or so, then you might have other issues.

-Rod

 

the computer reverts to factory settings as shorod said. each time you drive it collects your specific data and averages it with the factory data. after several starts, and a few miles driving, it will learn you.

 

Thank You for all the help!

 

Ok, I have driven it over 60 miles and It still hesitates when i come to a complete stop and throttle response is delayed. None of this was going on before the battery change. Here is another thing when the battery was installed on sunday, I lost all of my radio stations, yesterday I unhooked the battery for over 20 min. and I still had my radio stations when I hooked it back up. Weird?

 

If you turn the radio off before you disconnect the battery it will save the radio settings sometimes.
Have you checked for vacuum leaks?

 

Pull the codes. There may be a code stored even if the CEL is out.

 

yes, i would look around the battery to see if a vacuum hose was pulled off, or cracked when battery was pulled. check electrical plugs on the intake plenum, etc. other than that, you got an odd problem.

 

Had the codes pulled and there were none. It seems to run fine now. There is still a little hesitation in the gas pedal when you press it slightly. I'm gonna check all of the vacuum hoses again. Thanks for all of the help.

 

your habits may be drastically different than the factory settings, or the factory nubers might be screwed up. the more you drive, the more input the computer gets from YOUR driving. It only gets better with time.