Dash lights turn on and off and engine shuts off?

MARK6466

MEMBER
2007 FORD CROWN VICTORIA
4.6L
V8
2WD
AUTOMATIC
135,000 MILES

I bought the car and the first day the cluster went haywire, and the engine shut off. Put a new alternator and battery in it. Drove about 60 miles. The instrument cluster didn’t work at first but then came on mid trip. No other problems. Parked it and About 2 hours later it started up started out 10 miles in the alternator light came on, the lights went off and soon after it shut off. Can’t find any bad or corroded connections. Don’t know where to look.

3 Replies

KEN L

MASTER CERTIFIED MECHANIC
47,602 POSTS

It sounds like the ignition switch is bad but to be sure we need to use a test light to see if the wire colors grey/yellow, white/violet and violet/orange have power when the engine and cluster shut down with the ignition switch on. Please use this guide to help and I have included the ignition switch wiring in the images below to see what I am talking about.

https://www.2carpros.com/articles/how-to-use-a-test-light-circuit-tester

Check out the images (below). Please let us know what happens.

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Sunday, March 5th, 2023 AT 4:54 PM

MARK6466

MEMBER
2 POSTS

Super helpful info. The ignition switch is loose but seems to be okay for now. The lights in the instrument cluster are still not 100% so I’m digging into that as I go. Turned out the brand-new alternator was bad. It had zero output. I was reading the battery voltage feeding back into the alternator. As soon as I put in the replacement all the other issues went away.

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Sunday, March 12th, 2023 AT 9:18 AM

KEN L