Relay Problem?

[cowetadaddy]

After running for a while, my 02 Ford Windstar starts locking and unlocking the door on it's on and the door ajar light comes on the dash. This has been an intermitten problem for about a month. It doesn't do it all the time and even when it starts it, sometimes it could go for 5 minutes or 5 seconds. I was going to check the relays cause I thought one might be going bad, but the cover to the relays and fuses are only label with numbers and I don't have an owner's manual. Please help. Planning a long trip for next week and I want to solve this problem before then.

[bdahl385]

Have you tried cleaning the electrical plungers and contact pads on the rear sliding doors? On each door there is 4 or 5 spring loaded plungers that provide power / signals to the rear doors. These sometimes cause weird problems with door closure signals and locking. I clean mine with a childrens large pink pearl eraser on both the plunger end and metal base. You want them shiny silver looking.

The other culprit could be the wiring passing through to each front door in that large rubber flex tube. Windstars are known for their electrical problems at these points as wires get stretched and frayed causing open circuits or shorts if the insulation gets bare.

GLTY

[Airjer_]

If you need an owners manual you can get a PDF version off of the ford website.

[12Ounce]

When checking the door switches in an ajar situation, don't overlook the actual ajar switch which is at the rear of the door opening. Those heavy side doors can give this problem ... of upsetting all the locks as it jiggles in its opening. Make sure there's no trash lodged in the path of the rollers in the lower track.

[tomj76]

> Locking and unlocking on it's own...
> Door ajar light come on...

I had the second problem, but not the first. In my case I found the problem to be due to old lubrication in the door latch. The switch that senses an ajar door was not getting pressed down enough to close the switch. The door latch mechanism was sluggish and this kept it from making enough pressure on the switch.

I took the latch out of the door, sprayed it with WD40 to get it moving again, then put it back in. It's been fine since then.

The latch was hard to get out because of the various clips used inside the door. I think I could be done this without removing the latch, just by spraying WD40 into the latch, and working the door handle at the same time.

However, the fact that the doors are locking/unlocking spontaneously might point to a different or additional problem. These functions are controlled by the GEM (generic electronic module), which is located under the dash, on the driver side of the center console. I've read of people seeing strange behavior when the ground to the GEM was not good due to corosion.

[AvalonJohn]

How do you open the relay box next to the battery on 1999 3.8 liter. I can't get it open and don't want to break it ... do both sides detach or only onne side ?

Thanks,

AJ

[12Ounce]

Press down in the center and simultaneously lift on the rear edge/clip.

[AvalonJohn]

12Ounce,

Thanks!!

AJ

[serge_saati]

Of course it's not the relay!
When you have a bad contact on the door switch contact, the car "think" that the door is closing, opening, closing, opening, closing... So each time the car detects an closing door, it locks all the door. Then if it detects the key in the ignition just after locking the door, it will unlock all the doors so you will not be kept locked outside of the vehicle. And of course, the door AJAR light will be lighted. It's all the security system of the Windstar.

So the problem is with one of the door switch.