I'll become a mechanic yet

In an earlier post I talked about how I fixed the headlight covers on my Chrysler LeBaron.

Well, I've also been tackling a problem with my other vehicle, a '94 Town & Country in which the cruise control has not worked right for a couple years. It would not let me set a cruising speed except for once in a great while. Mostly it didn't work at all. And if it did work and then I had to disengage the cruise, then good luck trying to get the resume button to work. I’ve gone at it off and on over the past several months, but to no avail.

I started by removing the button unit from the steering wheel. I was able to open it up and get to the simple circuit board underneath to try cleaning contacts. Eventually I also figured out how to actually open up the button mechanisms themselves. A few sprays of WD-40 never hurts, but it didn't seem to help either.

The thing is, though, that taking the button unit off and cleaning it actually would get the cruise control to work significantly better, but only for a day or two. The more time would elapse, though, the more likely it would just go back to basically not working at all. But the fact that it would help for a short while distracted me for a long time from even thinking to look elsewhere for the problem.

Eventually, though, I decided to try a different angle of approach. I realized that tapping the brake pedal of course disengages the cruise control, therefore there must be something down near the brake pedal, some sort of connection or mechanism to check. Turns out there's a plastic connector on the end of some wires and the white clip it goes into is labelled "SPD CONT", so it obviously had to do with the cruise control.

I simply disconnected the wires—well, pulled the end with the plastic clip out of the "SPD CONT" unit. The connection didn't seem loose. In fact, I had trouble getting it disconnected, but finally I got it out. I then sprayed compressed air in and around the "SPD CONT" area just to blow out any dust and dirt that might have been present. I kind of doubt that there was really anything there that got blown out, but I figured it couldn't hurt. Then I reconnected things.

It’s worked ever since and I’ve made it a point to use the van at least a little bit every day just to keep testing it. Every time I push either the set or resume buttons, they work. It’s been almost a week, so I’m officially declaring the problem “fixed.”

As with my earlier post about the LeBaron headlight covers, I can’t help wondering how much a “real mechanic” would have charged for the labor and if he would have ordered new (unnecessary) parts. I have no way of knowing, but I do wonder. On the other hand maybe a real mechanic would have solved the problem a couple years ago when it first appeared. I’ll never know, but I’m just happy it’s fixed and particularly that I was the one who fixed it.


UPDATE:
(Sunday, January 7, 2007)

A month or two after my cruise control "fix" as described above, it suddenly stopped working again. Until I could figure out how to fix it, or at least get it working even if not exactly sure why, I un-published this blog entry and reverted it to draft status. Now it's time to re-publish it with this update...

I tried disconnecting and reconnecting the brake pedal wiring again, but it did no good. For some reason it had just quit working altogether—frustrating. This continued for a few weeks. I kept trying to fiddle with the brake pedal connections, then went back to operating on the steering wheel buttons as well, but just couldn't make any progress.

One night I drove to a local store about 15 minutes away and all of a sudden it worked (for no apparent reason), both on the way to the store and on the way back... that is until I did an extra drive around the block just to do some more testing while a CD played out and then it quit working again.

I kept trying stuff, mostly amounting to cleaning procedures and such, nothing fancy, but at best all I could achieve was some very intermittent functionality not lasting long.

Finally, one day I went to use the van and it wouldn't start at all—dead battery, but it was about at the end of it's rated life expectancy anyway. I got a new one, of course, and hoped that somehow the cruise problems were all due to the battery situation, but it still didn't seem to work. I tried a rubber band around the brake pedal connections in an attempt to hold together tighter what might be a somewhat loose assembly. That didn't seem to accomplish much either.

During all this random testing there was a period where I would try to set the cruise speed and the accelerator would jump forward as if the speed caught hold, but it would (usually) very quickly then lose the setting and speed would drop.

However, following much frustration several days ago it just seemed to start working consistently right again. I have no clue why, but I'm not messing with it. I leave the on/off button pressed in for the cruise control to remain activated. I don't want to take any chance that it's something in the the on/off switch and that pressing it will dislodge whatever might have fallen into place just right (if that is indeed what has happened). I ended up with the rubber band still on the brake pedal wiring connection too and I'm leaving it there—why mess with it?

Like I say... Can't explain it, but as long as it keeps working, that's good enough for me. Time will tell whether this newest fix holds, of course, but for now it's nice having it working again.