how many of you repair your own FICMs?

MorganY · Jan 12, 2012

Well with my new AE, I recently found my FICM shoots down to 40v when cranking...I called Ford and they want 556.57 for a half shell...hell I don't even have 300 to spend.

Has anyone tried this? Does it hold up well?

http://s202.photobucket.com/albums/aa236/DrQuad/FICM/

Atsah · Jan 12, 2012

I have done it and it worked okay but some of the components on the circuit board are marginal at best.. Swamps replaces quit a few of the components when you send it to them for repair..

Mdub707 · Jan 12, 2012

Your AE isn't getting a good reading either, do it with a multi-meter. The scanners can only read AS LOW as 40V, but not under. I bet it's worse than that. I repair them all the time. Doing 3 more tonight.

If you've never soldered before, it can be a PITA. I would recommend having someone who has worked on components like this before do it for you. I would also recommend re-staking the components after as well. I've found some suitable alternatives in Jegs and Summits (for staking compound).

jdc753 · Jan 12, 2012

When mine went out my dad resoldered it for me. I don't quite have the patience or experience for such electronics work but he has been doing it for longer than I've been alive. We repaired it November 2010 I believe and its been fine ever since.

One thing is even if the components and solder joints look fine, its best to just resolder them anyways. When my dad first pulled mine apart he didn't see anything wrong and no need to mess with it, but we ended up trying it anyways and it worked great.

Mdub707 · Jan 12, 2012

I've pulled the staking compound off before (the orange goop on the board) and it has pulled some of the components right off with it, meaning they weren't even attached. There isn't even enough solder on these to run them through a re-flow oven. They are made in Mexico... haha

jdc753 · Jan 12, 2012

Yup!! Same thing happened with mine, one of the resistors (I believe) pulled right up with the compound. This is when we realized it would be good to go through it completely, removed all the compound and resoldered all the places pointed out in the write up I had. This is what I followed for fixing mine, http://www.competitiondiesel.com/ficm/FICM.pdf

MorganY · Jan 13, 2012

jdc753 said:
Yup!! Same thing happened with mine, one of the resistors (I believe) pulled right up with the compound. This is when we realized it would be good to go through it completely, removed all the compound and resoldered all the places pointed out in the write up I had. This is what I followed for fixing mine, http://www.competitiondiesel.com/ficm/FICM.pdf

that is a great write up, thanks!