Hey all;
My dad has an '04 F150 (5.4L; AT; 4x4; XLT Supercab). The other day, as he was coming home from work, at approximately 50 mph, the truck died and made all kinds of strange sounds. He was able to coast to a place where he could get off the road, but the truck is doing all kind of weird things. The transmission is stuck park, the windows won't roll down (power windows), the dash lights don't work, and it won't even try to engage the starter. Not sure about other accessories, but the hazard flashers work and the head lights work, but according to him, not much else. He got it towed and the checked all the fuses, but they looked fine. After doing a search on this site, I think it has something to do with the security system, but is there any way to further diagnose the problem? Any advice / assistance would be greatly appreciate. Thanks in advance.

 

The very first thing to do is to have the battery and charging system checked and ALL of the battery cable connctions.

 

Ditto with the old guy- fords are notorious for not starting when the battery voltage is low. I would check bat voltage, maybe even a new battery and check the charging system. If he has remotes, do the remotes still work? Might need to reprogram the keys.

 

How could the battery / charging system cause those type of issues while the truck was running/ It literally quit running and shutdown at 50 mph?

 

Very easily, see the alternator is the electrical power plant for all things electrical after you start your car. The battery is mainly for starting purposes. So while your driving the alternator is replenishing what the starter took out of the battery while running all electrics in the car. When the alternator starts to go south, it will be ok as long at the output can stay above the volts and amps that the battery is at. Once the alternator goes further south, the car electrics then rely on the battery for power, so while your driving and the alternator is no long able to put out enough juice to support the trucks electricals or charge the battery enough, it starts draining the battery, FAST, and before you know it you are out of electric to run the truck, and pretty much everything runs off electric that is needed to keep the truck running.

So if the alternator is shot, the truck is getting its electric from the battery which is slowly draining because nothing is there to recharge it anymore. And when you loose all electric you will see some weird stuff. So get the battery checked and alternator, it could very well be that your battery is fine and your alt. is shot.

The computer runs the fuel pump, spark, ignition, injectors. The computer runs off electric. So if that is your problem it would have been like reaching under the hood and unplugging all of that while going 50mph down the road.