my car: a 2002 ford taurus 3.0L V6 OHV my story: purchased the car used in oct 2006 with about 45k. 8 days later the starter went. replaced and went on my merry way. a few times when the fuel ran low enough to flash the fuel warning light the car wouldn't start at the pump after i filled her up. i had to reset the fuel pump switch under the side panel in the trunk. stopped running it so low on gas. in the summer of '07 the engine light started to come on and go back out when the car was under load going uphill. it never stayed on for long and never interfered with state inspection. started to lose fuel efficiency next summer, replaced fuel pump. not 2 months later engine light came on and stayed on, just in time for my inspection to be due. took it to the dealer and had to pay a $50 copay on my extended service plan for the chump in the garage to act as if a woman has no business knowing what is really going on under the hood of my own car. he told me i needed to cough up another $80 to hook it up to a different code reader because it appeared to be an electrical problem, and when i refused and said it should be covered under the warranty, he suggested i take advantage of their sale and replace plugs and wires. took car to a different shop, replaced plugs, wires, cap and rotor. picked up car and engine light came right back on... took back to garage #2 discovered wires were defective, replaced the wires again... but could not get the light to go out. ended up replacing an oxygen sensor and after months of tweaking and replacing parts and getting the run around by yet another shifty mechanic i got my car back in the second week of january 2009. the engine light stayed off just long enough to get an inspection sticker. and i dealt with the loss of power and flicker of the light at every hill i drove up. in the summer of 09 i noticed the strong smell of antifreeze and a puddle under the rf wheel well. discovered that the reservoir tank had a little crack in the side and was leaking whenever i shut the car off. kept putting in more coolant and then realized that although i was putting in the green kind, the stuff leaking out was orange... and smelled really bad. by this time my engine light had come back on to stay. so after the holidays i brought her to yet another ford dealer, this time the mechanic was a trusted friend. code was a misfire in cylinder 3. the same code it kept throwing when it was in "garage #2" for months. so he opened it up and found the spark plug was very lose and very burnt. replaced plug in cyl 3. ran compression test and found there was only 75psi instead of 150psi. tried putting a little oil in to see if the ring was burnt, compression didn't increase... suggested i take it to an engine shop that wouldn't charge as much labor as they would. brought it to engine shop. *sigh* ended up the head was cracked, yep in cyl 3. replaced the head, a new fuel injector, exhaust valve and intake valve on cyl 3, new head gasket, replaced the reservoir tank and all fluids. got car back to put miles on to get all the monitors up and running so it would have sufficient history to pass inspection. drove less than 2 miles down the road, light came back on. brought it back and this time ended up replacing the camshaft positioning sensor. after all this it is now throwing a code 1336. i'm stumped. after all this time and money it seems as if there has been absolutely NO progress. to top it all off there is very little, almost no heat in this car now. barely any heat comes out and only when it's on defrost and on the lowest fan setting. when the fan is turned up higher its as if the blower is actually cooling down what little warm air there is. if it weren't for the fact that i still owe thousands of dollars on this hunk of crap i would have rolled it down a hill already. but the truth is i do owe money on this car, and i need reliable transportation for my children. if anyone has any advice on what this 1336 code is, and how to correct it, please send me a message.
- posted
14 years ago