problem with mercury milan rs

Installed an avital 4111 on a 2008 Mercury Milan. I used the db-all bypass (with the latest firmware from the xpresskit site)

The customer calls me last night, and says it remote starts and runs fine for 5 minutes. Then it stops running. It tries to start itself again and then stops. The radio stays on, but no start.

Any ideas? I haven't looked at the car yet, but was wondering where to start.

Did you connect and learn the tach signal or did you use virtual tach / voltage sensing? I'm not sure why it would run 5 minutes... its normally just a few seconds, but that's where I'd start.

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Kenny
Owner / Technician
KKD Garage LLC
Albany, NY 12205

no, i used virtual tach.....i have never had a problem with the virtual tach

I would connect the tach to be sure. I would also check how long it is really running for before shutting off before you go too far into it. Customers tend to exaggerate...haha. If its more than 5-10 seconds I'd say that the bypass is probably working correctly yet the starter isn't recognizing the vehicle as running.

Its very possible that the voltage threshold may not be very high in the milan so the vehicle does not appear to be running to the starter...

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Kenny
Owner / Technician
KKD Garage LLC
Albany, NY 12205

so if the tach threshold is to high, i'd have to run an actual tach wire any way then

I'm not sure what unit you are using, but some voltage sensing circuits also have a high / low threshold. The virtual tach really has nothing to do with the tach signal (from what little bit I've seen about it). From what I can tell I believe its just a little more sensitive voltage sensing setup. A true tach connection is always the best route to take.

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Kenny
Owner / Technician
KKD Garage LLC
Albany, NY 12205

set unit for 2 sec crank on voltage. it has built in over crank protection. never a problem.

He isn't having a problem with it starting though. the problem lies with not staying running... and the unit not sensing the vehicle running. So increasing the crank time won't accomplish anything.

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Kenny
Owner / Technician
KKD Garage LLC
Albany, NY 12205

put on voltage not virtual tach and turn off engine sensing.

Thats one way to do it, but why not do it the right way? A tach wire connection is the proper way to do it.

If you have trouble finding the tach then by all means put it on voltage and turn sensing off. Or use that as a test to see if the vehicle stays running.

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Kenny
Owner / Technician
KKD Garage LLC
Albany, NY 12205

I've done them with voltage and engine sensing on and its never a problem. you can hook up tach, but its not really necessary. let the car crank itself.

The tach signal is used for more than just engine sensing on many units. Granted I can't speak for the OP's unit, but many starters use the tach as an over-rev protection. I've sometimes had to use voltage sensing and yes it does usually work fine... but that doesn't mean its done right.

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Kenny
Owner / Technician
KKD Garage LLC
Albany, NY 12205

i don't think the avital 4111 has an engine sensing option. I will try voltage.....and if that fails run the actual tach wire.


I don't think i have used a tach wire in about 3 years, i have been using virtual on every one with out a problem but this is a ford, so who knows....

All the other methods are a kludge, tach is the only proper way to go.

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