Hello to All on the Forum.

New member just signed up in the hope some of you guys may be able to help!

I have a 2004 Fiesta Ghia Durashift (nightmare model)

Cost me so far £300 in garage cost to diagnose what's wrong with the Durashift gearbox. Had the car recovered 3 times in as many months. Last garage got it going and told me to trade it asap. :(

Now its in another garage ( who seemed not to want the aggravation of fixing it) with a estimate of £1800 and no guarantee it will work for any length after the £1200 module if fitted and programmed.

I have read some of the post on the forum regarding this problem and some seem to get away with little or no cost to them to. to. fix. All the symptoms my car has seem to be consistent with most of the posts on the forum.

My question to you all is,

Can I by a cheap code reader to read and clear the fault codes if so, make and website please.

Are reconditioned actuators,ECU's any good, is it only Ford dealers that can program them?

If you take the actuator off the car what size screws /torx will I require and can it be put back without programming?

I am not a young chap (67) have a basic mechanical /auto electrical knowledge but willing to have a go at a DIY repair.

Cheers everyone :)

Welcome to the family!

Hi can anyone recommed a DIY fault code reader to diagnose Durashift problems

Have a look at My signature, click 'got an error On your car?' for all the details you need

Also we have a thread which is in the mot and servicing section about fixing the durashift problem.

Hi Lydenboy sorry to hear you have a similar problem as I do. I started a new thread which you may find useful to read. Its under Durashift fix using a ebay type vcm diagnostic. The problem with my car is still not fixed, but what I did do was look at all of the mechanical issues that these systems suffer from. From reading many forums, it would seem that most problems can be repaired very cheaply, and not really needing a lot of mechanical knowledge. If I were in your situation, I would start with the wiring from the clutch actuator to gearshift unit, you may well be lucky and find a broken wire, or corroded wire. If you dont find anything wrong there, test the gearshift motors to see if they change gear. How you do that is, take the wiring plug off both motors, you will see each motor has 6 terminals. You will need to supply 12 v from the battery to terminals 1 and 6. (the unit does not take its earth from the chassis in the normal way, as it needs to send the motors in both directions). So if you try live to terminal 1 and earth to terminal 6, and the motor doesn't move, reverse them, as the motor may be fully extended in the original direction, (if i am making myself clear). I took the unit off to test, but this isn't maybe the best way on reflection, as you need to worry then about the system being in the right position etc etc. One thing I will say is you need to be sure not to short between the terminals you are using 1 and 6 between the other terminals that send messages to the TCM, the way I got around that was to push small connectors on to the terminals attached to leads that I could flash on the battery. (These connectors being like the ones that used to be used on the old type ignition coils on older cars). One last thing I would say on this is, the motors should literally jump as you supply voltage, if they do not, don't keep doing it as you may burn the motors out. Now if they do not move, you have checked the wiring from the TCU to these motors, fantastic, you will know whats wrong. Either one of the motors are finished, or more likely you will repair the car from freeing the rod, as described in the MOT section of this forum. 2p for glue. Now that would be brilliant. Anyway please let us all know the outcome. I hope your car ends up less of a problem that my car is turning out to be. Eddie

Hello again, sorry in writing the above, I didn't answer your original question. From my experience, the only diagnostic equipment that seems to do the full monty on these Durashift is Ford ids with a vcm connector tool. I borrowed a cloned tool bought on ebay for just about £350 which came with laptop so it was basically plug and play, and I am going to invest in one of these. My thinking is, how much to get the car towed to Fords, pay them, then tow it home again. Also I think if I ever sell the car in the future, the ebay tool can be resold......well thats my thinking anyway. Good luck. Eddie

Hi Eddie thanks for your reply. Current situation is, checked all the wiring I could, seems all in order. Sent actuator to ecutesting.com awaiting their reply spoke to my local Ford garage they want £135 + to bleed the clutch and reprogram the TCM and actuator. Between a rock and a hard place at the moment wondering if I should keep throwing money at the car. Not really confident how long the car will run if I am successful with any repair. Will keep the forum posted on the outcome. Cheers

Hello Derek. So you have sent the actuator off. If you read my thread, you will see that people have said the TCU being your original should just reprogram itself, but only go forward with it, do not put it in reverse before it has set itself up. Why would you have to bleed the clutch? When I removed the 2 13mm bolts on the bottom of the actuator i lost no fluid. Looks to me that the motor just pushes against the fluid line to make the clutch work. When you checked the wiring, it seems the the wires between the clutch actuator and the gearshift actuator are the most likely to be defective. As I said in my thread, if you peel enough outer insulation off, this cluster of wires will become completely detached from the engine wires, so you take them in the house to have a good look. Do you have a multi meter? if you do, you can set it so it bleeps when you put the 2 tester probes together, then check each wire from one plug to the other. When checking the really small connectors, I just taped a sewing needle to the probe so i could get in to them, and I used an old spade connector to the other plug.

Another test which would be worthwhile is to test the supply actually going in to the clutch actuator.Now you have the plug of you look at the bottom, at the connection terminals, you will find a couple of dozen or more of very small connectors, they are not important for this test, you need to look at the larger terminals. You should see a smaller bank of larger terminals, one side has 3, the other only 2.. If you look at the 2, and have these so they are below the small terminals, the bottom one is earth. (left hand corner) the one above it is 12 volt continuous from the battery 30 amp. the one directly to the right of that one top of the bank of 3 is 12 volt live 15 amp. If you check them and you find no power, then again you follow back for another cheap fix.

Did you test the gearshift motors? You say it has broken down 3 times, I can not think an electronic problem would be the reason for this, unless there are bad connections, but once your unit has been tested you will know this for sure.

Don't give up Derek I would bet on it being something silly and cheaply fixed. Eddie