2010 Ford Focus Electrical issues and Overheating

Maintenance/Repairs
1

2010 Ford focus SEL 2.0 White 180k miles (first time having issues)

Problem 1: Overheating
a. Rad fan not running unless AC is turned on manually… (ordered a 30amp fuse to replace blown fuse) so this might be a fix.
b. My inside wont blow warm air when heat is turned on. I tried flushing heater core with hoses and a 2liter bottle of water. Seemed to go all the way through but it’s still not working. (Relay or fuse issue?)

Problem 2: Electrical, When I wire up my battery there’s a constant clicking sound under hood, it’s like every 2-3 seconds it clicks. It seems to drain my battery so it won’t start. (Short or parasitic draw?)

So I initially had overheating, so my friend and I replaced thermostat. Still overheating, So I replaced water housing unit, which was blown out spilling coolant. Still overheating. One of the hoses was leaking coolant bad so I replaced with a custom fit hose. Noticed the radiator cooling fan isn’t turning on unless I turn on the AC recycle thing then it does turn on. It’s still overheating after about 2 min of sitting at operating temp.

New issue is occurring now, when I walked outside I heard ticking sounds when near the car. I opened the door and saw my dash going crazy, lights flickering ect. So I unplugged the battery, I plugged it in after 30 min and it wouldn’t start. I looked everywhere for a short or damaged wires, didn’t see anything. Tested the fuses near driver side under hood, one of the 30amp fuses was blown. I believe it’s for the rad fan, which makes sense. I have one on the way in mail now. Could a blown fuse be causing issues like the battery drawing over 4 amps? Seems like a ton of amps. Almost as if the battery itself is shorting out you know what I mean? Like as if the main electrical flow is connected when it shouldn’t be? I don’t know much about cars or electrical issues. No budget to take to a shop.

When I hooked up the battery today, it seemed fine, I drove around the block once and it was fine. Then later I went out and it was doing that ticking sound again… Battery was drained and wouldn’t start. I set multimeter to amps and disconnected negative from battery, I then had the pos lead from multimeter connected to the ground wire that usually connects to the battery terminal. Then touched the negative lead from multimeter to the batteries terminal. Amps jumped up to 4.45 maybe higher (my multi only reads 5amps) also I hear a click sound every time I touch the terminal, it’s down under the hood, near drivers side wheel. Sounds like maybe it’s a relay or some kind of switch. I feel like it’s a super bad parasitic draw right? Like a short? Please any help would be huge. I’m at wits end and so frustrated.

2

You got quite a few problems there. hmmm … if I had that assortment I’d start on the worst, which is the battery is getting drained by a 4+ amp draw. That’s definitely out of whack. The most the battery draw should be with everything off is maybe 0.1 amps. 4 amps is 4 x 12 = 48 watts. That could be a headlamp or a couple of light bulbs, so start by verifying no light bulbs are lit when they shouldn’t be. If that’s not the problem then I’d start disconnecting stuff until I found which circui was causing the 4 amp draw. I’d start with the alternator, b/c a diode fault there could cause a pretty big draw. Suggest to plan that solving all these problems is going to take some considerable time. If you need the car as a daily driver, to get to work etc, might be better to pay a qualified shop to at least find out what’s wrong. Then you can fix the problem yourself if you want.

Some caution when using a meter to measure 4 amp currents, b/c the measurement can easily damage the meter if the current is too high. And make sure you have the meter and lead positions configured correctly for measuring large currents, read the manual how to do it.

3

You can probe fuses using the milivolt scale and connecting to the exposed connections on the tops of the fuses, unless it’s nearly impossible to access the fuses like it is on the Ford Fusion.

Does this vehicle require opening a vent to release air when adding coolant? Fords often do. If not, it could be a leaking head gasket. Is it losing coolant? Fords usually use cylinder head temperature for the temperatuge gauge, so it is always accurate. The radiator fan might use coolant temperature, which may be cold, since it may not be circulating.