the honeymoon is over

[tasdex]

righto ,,
to start things of , the missus and i bought a clean / straight 2002 lr focus lx ,2.0 liter zetec auto with 175,000 k's and thought all was well .
and of corse , after a few weeks of ownership , you start to notice your new " family car " ,, has its ferboils .
some quite annoying .
some mornings on fire up ,, its like the choke does not engage ,, motor chuggs at about 500 rpm ,, then dies ..
can do this a few times ,,,,unless you just manage to dab the throttle " just a tad mind you ,, then behaves as normal ,, revs raise to about 1200 and steady . normal warm idle is at bout 800 odd .
car will be fine for the rest of the day .
first thing done was an injector clean bottle made its way into the tank , had about a quarter of a tank of bp 95 premium in there ..
next day ,, same chuggy start up .
on buying the car , we noted that it had a battery with the sight window , and it was indicating " green " ,,charged .
but have noted that it is now showing black ,," discharged " ..on inspection in the owners book , it states that if the battery is removed or thus ,, that the auto gearbox and motor need a few k's to " adjust to each other " and the car may behave oddly . is this related ..?
next stop is check the maf ,, and thinking a clean of the throttle body ....
wich brings me to the next ferboil ........
i know that its " sposed" to be a 4 speed auto ,, but on cruising at steady throttle at say 80 or 100 k's ,, its like the auto picks up a 5th gear ,,,re reading the owners book revealed it " the auto " has a lock up torque converter ,, is this mistery gear the converter locking up ? ...
also , you can be gliding down a hill ... off the throttle ,, at 100 k's ,, revs show arround the 2300 mark ,,,,on odd occasions ,, you can watch the tacho jump to 2800 and away you go ,, speed builds all by its self ??????.
next ferboil ,,,
on going through the focus section on here ,, and reading about the most common problems that " afflict " their respective owners ,, the usual suspects include the dreaded blocked cat converter ,,,
think i may have this ,,
car is gutless going up hills ,, auto gets sort of confused changing from 4th, to 3rd , and feels lifeless ,, like it runs out of breath .i now just disengage 4th and have to hold the throttle bout 80% down ..will not kick down to 2nd over 100 k's ......also listened to the missus drive away from the house the other day ,, and heard a buzzy sound from the car ,, sounded like exhaust buzz from the front of the exhaust just as she applied the throttle .
but i always had impression that a failing cat converter was best picked by a rotten egg smell from the exhaust ...... no smell coming from this one .
we want to put a free flowing 2 1/4 exhaust ,,, looks like a new cat is in order first .
on reading just about every lr exhaust thread on here ,, it seems a single rear ,, or mid good flow " not straight through " muffler box is best ,, we dont want a " boomy" exhaust ," auto remember " , just deeper , and to free up some of the power we think is being held back .
some say a resonator mid stream ,, but no-one mentions how far allong to put said resonator ..
old trick was to draw a line with texta allong from the cat back ,, run the car ,, then note where the texta mark " burnt off to " ,, resonator goes there .....
any one chime in on this .
sorry for the essay ,,,thank you for taking the time to read it .
if you can help my with these problems ,, please speak up ...
missus loves the car ,, wanted one for ages ,,, was crook on me for picking a subaru outback as our last car ,,hassled me till we got this lr ...
but the ferboils are driving me nuts !!!

[Russ]

Sorry to hear of your issues with the car, been there and done that too many times :( Before stressing out too much with this though I would definitely recommend either having the throttle body properly cleaned or if you can DIY even better to keep costs down The battery dying is a common thing, especially with the change in season and the temperatures starting to get colder. I'm not all that familiar with auto transmissions but if it hasn't been serviced then that would be the next step I would take there. It may even pay you to have a diagnostics check done on the car to see if it's throwing any error codes, this can quite often be the most cost effective way of sorting out issues with modern day cars Best of luck with it !!

[tasdex]

hi russ ...
the auto its self was replaced ,," will check the service records on how long a go , and post it up ."
i did read the thread on here last night in regards to removing the throttle body and cleaning out with a carb cleaner with a tooth brush .
how much on average are folks paying to have the diagnostic check done ? .

[Franco Cozzo]

At an auto electrical workshop its usually like $70-$100 for a scan.

[Russ]

Have you checked the transmission oil and level ? The level and condition of the oil also plays an important role in the operation

[tasdex]

all levels check out ok .

[DZFord]

Your cold start problem is likely to be battery dying. My partner had the exact same symptoms with her Fiesta and a battery change solved the problem.

I have no idea about your auto trans problem though sorry. Although Russ brings up a good point - when was the last time the trans oil was changed?

As for the cat converter, why don't you get an exhaust shop to check it out for you, and at the same time, get a quote on the catback exhaust that you're looking at?