Cruise Control Cable Repair

[rlb245]

Well it was Sunday evening! all the yard work was done and I was sitting the back deck, having an ice cold beverage! I was leafing through my favorite reading material. "Ford repair manual" grin!!!! and I run it to the section on cruise control system. Now I have in all honesty, have been avoiding this section. The cruise control system on the old girl has never worked sense I bought her. So I've steered clear of it for 2 or 3 years now because I'm a little intimidated by what seems to be a some what complex system and I didn't think really needed it. But I was feeling adventurous that day and said, What the hell, I can't break it. So I read what little info there was in the my Chiltons manuel then fired up the PC and started ALLDATA. There is so much more info in that program. Printed out a visual inspection form for 1987 Ford F-350 6.9 dually and went out to the truck and a visual inspection. Every thing appeared to be perfect.

Tests

1. Using an ohm meter I checked the clutch and break switch = good

2. Started truck and checked the vacuum dump valve for proper operation = good

3. checked horn relay simple by blowing the horn = good

4. I pulled the cruise cable at the at the servo controller = bad news

The cable was broken and was no long to the servo actuator. So no problem I'll just get a new cable and it will be right a rain. RIGHT?
So after 3 auto parts stores and the old NOT IN STOCK and WE CAN"T GET THAT PART ANYMORE I set out on a mission to try and repair what I had. Beside it's not rocket science.

The Repair

Remove the cruise control cable from the vehicle. see removing cruise control cable in manual

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As you can see the small metal ball that slides into the receiver of the servo has broke of the end of the cable. Well i figured no problem, i'll just weld the ball back on with a little silver solder and it will be good as new. I take the little ball and try to drill out the old cable. Man that **** is hard 2 drill bits later.

New plan, fabricate a new end for cable. Down to the hardware store and pickup a short length of 1/4" CR round stock and a 8# 32 allen head set screw. Then raid the tool box for a hack saw, file, center punch, 8#32 tap and drill, 8#32 bottoming tap and a 3/32 drill bit. I put the bar stock in the bench vise and center punched a start for a hole a 1/4" in from the end and drilled a 3/32 hole throw the center line of the bar stock. Then I turned the bar stock in the vise and to where I was looking at the 1/4" round end and center punch a starter for the correct drill size for an 8#32 tap. Then drilled a hole about 1/4" deep. (it intersects the 3/32 hole). Then I taped the hole with 8#32 tap. Fooled by the use the bottoming tap to insure there were threads all the way to the bottom of the hole. Then I used the hacksaw to cut a 1/2" part away from the rest of the bar stock.
The Finished Prodct

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Unfortunately the cable had broken just inside the sheath. So what to do? I pull the cable out of it's sheath and cut the sheath using a 3/32 cut of wheel in my 4" hand grinder about a 1/4" from the housing that bolts to the servo.
IMPORTENT : keep the heat down when your doing this. The sheath has a Teflon lining and it can be ruined

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Then removed about an 1.5" from the end of sheath.

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Then cut back plastic coating about an 1" on the sheeth.

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It was easy to remove the part the sheath that was still in the housing by using a pare of plyers and pulling it out a couple of stands at a time. I used a drill the same diameter as the sheath to clean up the bore of the housing where I pulled the remaining sheath

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Next I cleaned up the end of the sheath and and inserted it back in the housing nice snug fit. No clue needed

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I stalled the cable back in the truck. I inserted the part I made it the receiver of the servo with the set screw at the top. put the cable throw the 3/32 hole and adjusted the cable slack and tightened the set screw. Then bolted the housing back on the servo.

Hind site

1. I could of simple made another from the 1/4" bar stock ans silver soldered it on but sense I didn't no the original length of the cable i figured better save than sorry with some adjustment.

2. On a sad note the the cruise still doesn't work but the cable it is good to go if I ever figure it out.

3. I enjoyed this little project an hope it might help some one with a similar problem.

4. Cost of project was about $5. I wonder what I new cable would have cost

 

[rlb245]

It's to bad I didn't spell check or edit my first post. I hate getting old. Senility strikes every 10 seconds lol

 

[freebird01]

dunno but there is a small brain box under the dash for the cruise...perhaps alldata has a procedure for testing it? or perhaps the buttons on the steering wheel are shot?

 

[rlb245]

Alldata has it all I'm just not looking forward to laying on my back or side under the dash. Not as spry or agile as i use to be

 

[typ4]

Spelling errors are fine, especially where you said no CLUE needed. Thanks for the laugh, I needed it as its been a heck of a day.

My hands dont fit any keyboard, so I find myself making plenty or boo boos.


BTW ,great fix. Some bicycle cables work for repairs too.

 

[ifrythings]

Pull the steering wheel see if the 2 sliding contacts are still a nice shape or if the look like "cliffs", on mine, cruise would work only in certain spots of turning, horn always worked right though.

 

[rlb245]

Typ4! stick around I'll have you laughing allot. lol ifrythings I've printed out the test sheet and the circuit schematic for the cruise control system. It's a lengthy thing with allot of wire testing with an ohm meter. I'll see if I can post a copy of it here for any one to use. This program (Alldata) covers vehicles all the way up to 2006

 

[rlb245]

If you guy's need any info just give me the year and model and I'll see what I can pull up. No worries!

 

[KyleQ]

Wow, way more involved than I thought... I want to get my cruise working, but my horn stopped working last year - any obvious places to start?

 

[rlb245]

The power for the cruise control switches come's from the horn circuit . Check for voltage at the horn button in the steering wheel. If there is no voltage there then check the fuse or for a broken wire or a bad connection in that circuit. On my 87 the wire is DB (dark blue) and there are to connections. First connections labeled (C305A&C305) the next connector is at the brush plate. Let me no how it works out.

 

[KyleQ]

Thanks - I'll have to take a look, not sure how the steering wheel cover comes off - but it did work... I'll clamp the horn down and check to see if I've got power at the horn, the electrical on this truck is lame and the body is a bit soft. Ugh - so want a cab swap, but most everything still works.

 

[rlb245]

Well got of my butt yesterday and finally got in to the wiring of this old girl. After running almost every circuit test there was and finding no problems I was a little upset with my self. Surely an old field service tech is not going to a simple cruise circuit stump him. So I went back to square one an read the documentation again and went through the schematics as well and reviewed my test results. Every thing pointed to the servo motor malfunction because there was no movement when I ran the operational test. BUT WHY? My test results indicated the correct resistance on each solenoid coil and the correct voltage was being applied to the coils. Well it's at this point the manual instructs you to replace the servo system. My question is why? Well I didn't! I said to my self lets opener up and see what makes her tick. It's not like I"m going to brake it. So I pull the cover and see exactly what the schematic shows. Two solenoid coils in parallel. I head on down to the electronics work bench in the cellar and get out my home made ring test and test the coils of both solenoids and find that they are not shorted internally. I get out my DC power supply and apply 12v dc to each coil. One coil is working perfectly. I hear a distinctive click when voltage is applied but the second has nothing. I look at how the solenoids are mounted and see that they are held in by 3 plastic tabs. I released the plastic tabs and cut the wire to it and removed the solenoid from the system. Trust me it was allot easier said than done! These are open style solenoid and are easy to take apart. I just straitened the tabs that are crimped over on the top and pulled it apart. The plunger had rusted closed do to moisture in the system and the seat on the opening was pitted and no longer sealed properly. I used a faucet seating tool to to remove the pitting on the seat then used a tubing chamfer to restore the convex sharpe. Remove all rust and insured the solenoid worked before installing it back in the system. It is now waiting to on the bench for me to install to test.

OK! Oh many of you think this will ever work again? How money of you would have bought a new or used one? How many of you would have went this far for a silly cruise control. grin

 

[rlb245]

OK just got back from a road test. Cruises works perfectly. Nice and steady no problems. It was an interesting project not as hard physically as I anticipated. I'm 62 and have some problems if I have to lay in awkward positions.

 

[BrandonMag]

Glad to hear you got it figured out. Nice sense of satisfaction, eh?

 

[rlb245]

Yes it is. But in all fairness I tried to take to take the easy ways out first. Buying a new servo but couldn't fined one. Then went to a couple of junk yards to see what I could find and got a couple of other parts but nothing for the cruise system. I've talking to a few friends of mine localy that tell me the same servo unit was use on some of the big Ford passenger cars so i'm going back to the junk yards and check this out. If it's true I'm going to get a couple for parts.