1997 Ford Taurus GL

I did not have a choice in buying this car it was a car for my mom that my Uncle bought without me present and transfered it to my name for my mom to drive I added her to my insurance the car runs well other than these issues & obviously I want to know what causes these symptoms if it's something minor I can fix, considering everything else seems to be fine with it I checked all the levels and can't find anything visibly wrong, but these problems I pointed out. Jeesh don't be ****s peopls

You bought a 14 year old car. You bought a 14 year old car without bringing it to a mechanic for evaluation. The root of the problem is not the car.

I hope you got a great price for the car. You will now have to pay some of the money you thought you saved on several repairs.

Good Luck.

Please do no take this the wrong way, but all that have replied so far are correct even without a definite asked question by you. Confused, let me get to the meat of the problem for you. This may take a minute.

Just a few years ago you were able to purchase a used car with or without a mechanics evaluation. For if there were any hidden problems they were easily identified and repaired at a fair price. Cars were simple and the replacement parts were low cost. Today that is no longer the case.

Cars today are becoming a non serviceable item. What I am saying is that after the warranty is off the car it becomes a liability on your wallet. When they start wearing out, other than normal routine serviceable items ie: brakes, exhaust, shocks, etc.. the diagnostic fees and the following repair cost is no longer justified. That's if you can even find a mechanic that can identify and correct the problem without your car being his education, for that will cost you more.

Mechanics come from tech schools that have educators that are as knowledgeable as when they first started teaching. So most are 15 years behind. The mechanics leave school and are thrown into servicing cars where they are not qualified to deal with 50% of them.

As the mechanic encounters new cars and systems he has to learn on the car he faces. It becomes his continuing education, trial and error, all at your expense. It cost more to have a car repaired by a grease monkey than a technician.

Parts and labor are also an issue. On cars of the 60s you still can replace the whole entire ignition system for about $100. From the plugs to the coil and the points. You can test the entire ignition system with not much beyond a simple $10 meter and know exactly what the issue is.

This is not the case on these newer cars. The test equipment is in the 10s of thousands of dollars, the mechanics do not know what they are doing, and the cost of labor and parts is measured in NASA dollars.

Buying a used car is a crap shoot, period. To better the odds in your direction you must make sure all items on the car are functioning as they should. If you can not do this, have a mechanic verify that all the systems are working. If there are some problems, the mechanics can tell you what they are.

Not that the mechanic knows the cure, or even the cause of the problem, just that there is a problem. Then, if all is well and you purchase the car, you are starting out with all systems go. Just remember that people get rid of their cars for a reason and that any part of that car can fail at any time.

I know some mechanics might get offended by my reply, so be it. I am correct on my statements. Good mechanics are out there, but they are the exception. And if you cannot find a good one, get an honest one.

Good luck with your car and have a great day.

Not trashing, and we see "I recently bought a 1997 ford Taurus GL with these following symptoms" and offered future suggestions. Take it easy there tiger.

The simple answer to your problem is to replace the wiring harness.I have the same problem on my Mercury Sable which is a 1999. I really love this car. It was my wifes go to work car, but she got it hot when a radiator hose burst. She just kept going cause she ain`t going to walk, but she ended up calling me after the damage was done. The sensors were all reading wrong after being that hot, and after rebuilding the engine, things are still suspect. The Temp. gauge is slightly off, the fuel gage is correct as far as I know. The dome light stays on all the time, so I unplugged the bulb. A flashlight now works as well. The window wipers come on by them selves, even with the switch off. They wipe about 3 times, then shut off. When the door open light comes on, I know the wipers are going to do their thing. Also, the radio will change from AM to FM. Go figure. Actually, when the door ajar light is not burning, things are more normal.I bought my wife a new car, which is what she was aiming for anyway. I kept this to drive locally. She drives 100 miles a day to work and back. I go no where except to town a few miles away. Just drive the car and be grateful that is all that is wrong. My grand kids call my Sable Christine after the Steven King movie hit.She does have a mind of her own, but shes paid for, and I like this car. Hope this helps.

well I would but if it's a minor problem like mentioned at the bottom and we ignore it and drive it say a cheap part that needs replacing in the transmission and it prevents it from correctly shifting then ignoring the problem only makes it worse and eventually you have no transmission at all. That's all I'm concerned about, not everyone is good with cars so the guy who sold it may have known a trick to reset the service light and that explains why the clock was off by a few hours, but maybe he just found out there was something wrong with the transmission and did not get a real price check on fixing it or look into exactly what it needed instead like most people he just thought better get rid of it fast transmission problems are costly and sold it. So it's at least worth looking into things when there's something going wrong at least I think it is. On my other car that still runs great people were all telling me to junk it the transmission is gone, it's way past it's end of life cycle. No one thought to think how I managed to get it way past it's end of life cycle taking better care of it than most people do. And I found out all that was wrong is the auto parts sold me the wrong axle, so after putting the correct axle in & getting a power flush on the transmission (that is only 4 years old, practically new still) it runs like new still. Oh & the transmission has been maintained well with power flushes from the time it was new, so I was going to get a regular power flush on it anyway, but the metal shavings from the mistake the auto parts store did , made me have it done slightly sooner.

Oh I found out amco is does free diagnostics, so going to drive the car in there tomorrow and check that out see if it's just something minor.

Is there anywhere I can find a copy of that service manual that is not so worn? I would be afraid that important pieces of pages are missing from that picture.

There are several manuals on ebay. I just looked at one to generate the link. Go to ebay and search for the manual using Service Manual 1997 Ford Taurus or Shop Manual 1997 Ford Taurus.

does this look like a good buy? http://cgi.ebay.com/ebaymotors/ws/eBayISAPI.dll?ViewItem&item=310265453644&fromMakeTrack=true#ht_500wt_823 I am considering it cheaper than the pdf one I found and looks like its in good condition.

is ebooksoultionstore a trusty worthy source they sell a pdf printable for 20 dollars, would take less space& if I needed I could print off the pages I am working with. but they say it's the full facory repair & service manual for the car, just wondering if there claim is true anyone ever deal with them before how's the quality of their ebooks in pdf?

It is best not to buy an ebook service manual. Get the real deal. That is my 2 cents. And yes the $14.99 book looks to be in good condition. The shipping is way to much for Media mail cost. It's all up to you.

thank you, I appreciate your helpful insight I will let you know if there is any more info I can offer on other issues and check into the grounding circuits as you outlined for the interior light.

Just wanted you to know, electrical problems are the hardest to find, then define. Just when you think you have it solved, then you find out its much worse than you thought. The wiring harness at a salvage yard is like gold to them. Finding someone competent enough to change it out is a chore in itself. You almost have to by process of elimination replace all the sensors. This is going to cost you some big buck before your done. If I was you, I would just drive it as it is, and be grateful to have a running car.It sounds like a few minor problems, but not anything that you cannot live with. Why spend a ton of money on a throw away car. If things have to be perfect for you, then by a new car, and spend the first year at the dealership getting all the bugs out of it. Thats why I seldom by new.UNLESS, the wife insist.

sounds like a ford five hundred if you have to spend a year getting it fixed when it's brand new. I would never buy that model car again, my mom had one of those so many problems on it and it was by far the worst car they made in my opinion anyway.

Ok. I hope you don't take this wrong as well. I appreciate all of the help you all think you are giving me, and I agree on how to buy a car. That is the way I would do it too. I do agree with you. I will repeat this: I did not buy this car. My mom has no money; my uncle bought her the car. She can not afford the insurance is why it's in my name. I am adding her to mine. Now to the problem. I have given the information about the car. Is there anyone out there that can tell me what they think I should check or do first on this car? Or someone who has had these problems too and knows what is wrong with it. Again, I would like to point out, I did not buy this car. If I buy a car I would first have a mechanic look it over. I would also make sure myself that the car was a good buy. But I was not in on the decision to buy this car. I hope you can understand this and help me out. I would appreciate no more answers to the past as to what I should have done when the car was bought. It is in the past and cannot be undone. Thank you for any help you might give me.

sorry I just don't see a reason for insulting people and being rude no matter what the forum is intended for or used for that's all I meant. Yes I know and that's not what I was trying to do, it just bugs me when people answer without thinking like I would (is this really a helpful answer that I would appreciate if I were the one asking the question I am answering)

theres no conection between engine light and interior light.

check wiring from door switches

5. When you turn off the car it powers down loudly reminiscent of an airplane though that would be too much of an exaggeration

it powers down !! please explain

When I shut down my Mercury Sable which is a 1999, it spools down like the turbo on a big Catipilliar. It is the coolest sound I`ve ever heard a car make with a 3.0 engine. Several people look at my car when I shut it down for that reason. In this small town close to where I live people are always saying I have been modifying my engine again. I`m somewhat of a gearhead . I have seen other models like mine, and when shut down they sound like any other car. Just dead quiet. But mine sounds so cool, and has from the day I purchased it, and it has no turbo. Just a 3.0 with fuel injection that will outrun most v-8 on the road.

my scanner says p0761 shift sol c ckt perf stuck off. That is if it is a 3.0. some times the shift solenoids are mounted externally with the actuator going in to the trans. I went through this crap with my daughters 2002 Honda accord,yea i know Honda's are not supposed to break. I was able to find a wealth of info by searching the Honda accord forums. the articles showed and told you how to exactly test the parts. She now drives a brand new civic,and i cant find my wallet. You problem could be as simple as a bad ground. on 1 ford truck i owned the door is ajar light would come on and off and on. That was a bad plunger switch in the door jam,a very common problem. the other ford truck the head lights would turn off and on when they were turned on. this was a bad head light switch in the dash,another common fomoco problem. Just be happy its not a dodge. My daily driver has been a 2004 Nissan 4x4 frontier.after a 120,000 miles it needs 1 cat converter,and it ain't cheap,but not bad for 120-k. My toys are GM,s. Good Luck,and give the forums a shot.

Seems to me that a wire is making a ground connection without going thru the switch. The wire is probably frayed at some sheet metal opening between the door switch and the light (I had a directional light problem that had a cut wire on one of my cars - real bummer to find, but after cutting out the bad wire and splicing in a new wire the problem went away (was a Ford product).

Heater not working - either the resistor pack operating off the switches is burnt out or the control module is burnt out. Another cause is a build up of rust/etc in the heater core - if that is the case, reverse flush the heater - my old Dakota had that problem and a little backflush removed a lot of rust.

Transmission problem - get the repair manual and check the wiring - sounds like this car had a submergence problem at one time.

Where did you say you brought the Ford from again?...............ONLY KIDDING!!!

Some helpful advice (I'll try to word this without making you angry). Type in "1997 ford taurus interior lights stay on" into google search. You should find what you are after here. ( a few of the guys above have already given you tips on this anyway". If you browse around the forums on the listed search results, you should also find info on all your other problems as well.

Have a good look around the car, for example the heater on one old car I had was not working. I checked everything I could think of but then found out that the radiator hoses that were supposed to go to the heater were cut off and plugged.

The interior light and door light issues are most likely associated so if you fix one, the other will be fixed as well.

On a personal note, when I get uptight and when I feel the whole world is against me, I just count slowly backwards from 5 to 1 and breath in deeply between counts, and I'm happy again! You should not work on your car alone if you are not happy.

All things aside, please check the Ford Forum, there's a lot to be learned there.

Ford Taurus in 1997 has what is referred to as a Generic Electronic Module (GEM) that controls some of the interior light functions among other things.

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As suggested by others you would have more success asking these detailed questions on a Ford Taurus site. Here are a couple:

http://www.fordtaurus.net/forums/viewforum.php?f=49

http://www.taurusclub.com/forum/

It has been a few years since I sold my 1997 GL but remember a few things.

The SES light has nothing to do with the door lamps. Likewise when the open door warning indicator goes on, it obviously thinks the door is open so turns on the interior lights. Think about it. An easy first check is look on the forward door jamb and you will see a flat rod that enters into the leading door edge through a rubber boot. Squirt a good shot of WD40 into the boot to see if it unsticks the switch.

The SES light and error code obviously means you have transmission problems. That generation of Taurus was infamous for bad transmissions. To sell the car the previous owner probably disconnected the battery to temporarily clear the error code.

When you say the "heater not working" what exactly is not working? Fan not blowing? Engine not warming? Follow the routing of the heater hoses from the radiator to the heater core to see if it has been bypassed. I did this on my Taurus when the heater core leaked (heat is optional in Texas).

The Taurus has an electric radiator fan, and when you turn off the engine you will hear the fan coasting to a stop. This is normal.

the fan works good, just blows out really cold air even on hottest setting the temp gage reads the engine in a little below the normal heat an engine should have when running at normal temp, so I can pretty much rule out the thermostat there unless the gage is wrong. The AC works too, but really has a horrible on setting unlike my camry where I can adjust where AC comes out and I use it to defog my windows in there sometimes can't do that in this stupid car, cuz if it's on you can't control where it comes out at all cuz it uses that settings knob to turn it on very bad design wish I could change it, my mechanic friends have all told me that it would be too complicated to change that to a separate control

Thank you all for the more positive comments they are way more helpful. So far I think my best one came from a mechanic friend of mine, since it explained most or all of these symptoms. He pretty much went off what the auto zone slip print off said in the lower half to base his findings. It made the most sense to me anyway, I'm going to verify it if I can before proceeding if there is a shop that will look into free estimation big time one that can afford it, would hate to use a little time shop for that cuz I always buy the parts & do the work myself, so they don't make money on me usually, unless I'm totally out of options. He asked me what kind of gas mileage I was getting when I told him lousy gas mileage for this car. Then he said it's most likely stuck in second and that explains the loud noise when I turn the car off and the read out from auto zone saying it won't go into third gear. My question is if it's not going into third gear then driving over 35mphs like 60 the average how does that effect the transmission would it make any noticeable noises or would it show in the rpm's that something is wrong I have not been driving it myself so have not seen how the RPM's react at those higher speeds it seems to handle smooth & sound ok. Also he said the other issue is an electrical short, but might be also caused by the gear problem. So I should work on fixing the major problem first to see if the other one clears up on it's own then move on to the smaller one. So any thoughts?

sorry I did not mean it that way in case anyone took it to mean I thought my friend was more help than any of you. That is not at all what I meant even if it sounds that way. A lot of very helpful things were said in here that I do appreciate & I hope with the extra info if I'm wrong on my guess someone can let me know what they think this problem might be instead. I am going to buy the service manuals and originally I was going to buy them at the auto parts store, that was before I knew there was a better one that the manufactures used. So I really appreciate that helpful tip and now I will be buying the better versions online through ebay or somewhere for both my cars. Also the other links some of you shared I bookmarked the taurus specific ones found that post very helpful as well thank you. And even though I have a few friends who work on cars in shops, they are busy most times so I can't always get advice from them & I hope that when I can't some one out there can help me out with some kind advice like I get on here most times now.

Guest, You really need to stop acquiring cars that are not working, or spend the money on the shop manuals for these vehicles and start reading them.

Shop manuals are a great investment, they cover every aspect of a given vehicle, including troubleshooting techniques. Over time, you will become adept at tracing back, figuring out and fixing problems on your own, rather than running to others.

Learning is an exciting process, you should give it a try.

yeah, I just ordered the book for this car & as far as for running to others for help it's better than giving up. I've seen lots of other people ask for help on this site, so even though it was not set up for that it does permit it and that should include me if I really need help or advise from people in the field longer than me that may know right off what's going wrong. I like working on cars but had no schooling for it, just all hands on experience. So it's more of a hobby of mine, plus I don't ever get paid for it just the benefits from finishing the work and having a better car.

Had the same door light problem with a 1998 tarus which is very common to this era of tarus's. The door switch is located in the door latch, open the door and spray some WD40 onto the latch mechanism and this should correct the problem. Can't help with the other problems, sorry.

Thanks, I'll check that after I address the more major problem in the post just after yours.

There is a "range selector switch" mounted to the top of the transmission that senses the position of the gearshift lever. Mine intermittently had problems, and when it does the car will act as if it's possessed (radio & windows not working, locks start opening on their own, etc.)

It will also not let the transmission shift into high gear.

It is a simple piece to replace and might cure problems that were thought to be a transmission failure.

Thank you, this is what I'm leaning towards being the main problem at least for now before having the book. I am still waiting for shipping on the shop repair manual. I hope it's just this small inexpensive part, that sounds a lot better than the whole transmission being messed up. I will definitely check into this.

hey got a couple question for you all. 1. If a car is sold to you for way over the actual value can you dispute the taxes on it since the car was a riff off & the taxes reflect and incorrect value so it's like a double rip off the gov cheated you as well in these cases, but back to my question can you dispute it and get a refund for the overpaid taxes to switch the title?

2. If I find out when I do the full more detailed in depth diagnostics to pinpoint the exact problems on this car it turns out the car is worth nothing can I then gift it to the person who bought it for me and let them handle re-selling it or whatever they want to do with it. I could never sell a car, cuz I believe in full disclosure so I would give them the paperwork from the mechanics I had already took the car to and let them see for themselves exactly what is wrong with it. I know a few people out there would say no this is wrong just let them pay to get their own mechanics to evaluate the car & put as is on it, but to me that is still like trying to cheat people not smart enough/ or not wealthy enough to handle buying a car properly. I mean really some people out there can't afford a mechanic to look the car over and it should not be that dishonest a market really. I would never personally buy a car without having it looked over, but I know people that just don't think to or can't afford the cost to get a good mechanic to look it over properly, so I really think it's ridiculous that private party sells have become so dishonest and bad. I advise everyone I know buy it from a dealer even a used car at a dealer has some kind of warranty & then your not completely screwed if something is wrong with it. The price markup is worth the better protection of buying from a company that can afford to provide a warranty & make sure you get a warranty as well if the dealer don't offer one go somewhere else. Sorry for the rant, just bugs me the world has gotten so crooked most people used to be honest back in the day & at very least they would not sell you something that could easily kill you without a warning I mean this car they should have warned we have grease smeared all over the window & it doesn't wash off so don't drive this at night the whole window you need to drive safety goes wight like a bottle of white out was spilled over it. I mean that's something that could easily get you in a wreck if it comes on all of a sudden & nothing works to clear the fog, cuz of whatever they put all over the glass. I suspect either some anti-fog applied wrong and too much of it or plain out en-dust either way I have given up trying to clean it my microfiber cloth gets so greasy after cleaning one little spot on it that it just starts smearing the stuff around again. Is there anything that will remove this from the front window of a car? Also what is it anyone know first time I noticed it was when it made the whole window go completely white, then as it started to clear away it looked really greasy like when you spray a table with en-dust spray, then after it completely clears there is no sign of it goes invisible and I can't see it to clean it off even when applying cleaner it seems to buff into the glass more instead of washing off & it's all over the inside of the glass.

Oh I forgot also does it cost to gift a car to someone else for the title transfer, I never did it before so I don't know but if only doing it so someone else can handle selling it, cuz I don't want to be involved I'm not paying for transfer so they would have to & not sure they will consider it worth it since they already more than likely lost money on this car if they have to re-sell it, esp if they use full disclosure like I would or even a slightly lesser extent of what I consider that to be.

You know it's a bad car if your car that is 6 years older than it still works better than it does. lol

If you finish this successfully and need another project, perhaps a Chevy Cavalier?

lol is that chevy's equivalent mistake to fords here with this year and make?

We have about ten questions a month about a Cavalier... It won't start, the wipers won't shut off, the transmission is stuck in second... lots of problems with that car. It seems to be the most unreliable automobile ever built.

Even if someone makes a gift of one, refuse it!