2000 LS 3.0 Manual Trans Shifting Issue

[TheMachinist]

This is my first "official post" guys so go easy on me. LOL. So I bought this damn car and it's lucky I love driving it so much or else I would of set it on fire by now with as many problems as I've had with it already in the ONE MONTH I've owned it. But I do really, really love this damn car. So it's a manual trans and when I engage the clutch to shift the engine revs a few hundred RPM's. I also have the weird speedometer problems with it randomly crashing to zero and then getting dashes on my odometer. It's very intermittent but what I've noticed is that when the speedometer does fail, it DOESNT rev between shifts anymore. I'm in the dark here. Any help would be great. Thanks in advance.

 

[milehighmikey]

One has to wonder if the car has ever been underwater. I have driven 300K miles on my two LS manuals and never seen any of this happen!

 

[craigh]

One has to wonder if the car has ever been underwater. I have driven 300K miles on my two LS manuals and never seen any of this happen!

Same for me, but only 200k between my two LS's. Looking at your symptoms I don't know that there is a correlation between the problems and that you have a manual transmission, especially the dash issue. I would agree with Mikey that there may have been a water issue in the past. Either underwater or a leak that got into the electrical system somewhere. I suggest that you repost the issue regarding the dash problem and not identify in the title that it is a manual. I think you will find somewhere on the forum that someone else has had the same issue.

If you want to fix this yourself I would suggest that you start with a new can of the QD Electrical Cleaner and start pulling apart suspect connections, spray them down and reassemble. Do this with the battery disconnected. Myself I would start with the fusebox under the hood. Pull it up so you can see the wires underneath and spray the cleaner in there.

If you find a solution that works, please post it here.

 

[pragmatic]

I get a random all dashes for the odometer. Cycling the key fixes it, or it goes away by itself after a few miles. I usually just clutch cycle the key and declutch problem gone. Maybe once every six months or so. Never had it rev between shifts. Are you sure the throttle is not sticking? I've put 154K on mine (purchased with 36K) in 13 years.

 

[Telco]

Welcome. A couple of tips to make your life here easier. Your car has Coils on Plugs (COPs), not coils or coil packs. I mean, everyone knows what you're talking about when you say coils but these OCD beasturds flip out on you when you call them anything other than COPs. Next, use Google to search for things because folks here will search for any questions you ask and if they find a post that has similar words they'll come down on you like a ton of bricks. Other than that, they're a great bunch of guys you wouldn't mind drinking a beer with.

Now then, on to the problem. It sounds to me like you might have an intermittent open in the instrument cluster. Not a common problem on these cars, but I've heard of this on other cars. Either the cluster itself has an open, or the cluster plug-in has an issue. Just a guess, mind, based on what I've heard of on others.

 

[G-RELL]

Have you tried loosening your coolant cap???

Just kidding.. Not sure on the manual LS's, but when an automatic dash starts flickering, Its usually a good sign the alt and/or battery is failing. Id wait for others, but that where id start investigating.

 

[joegr]

Another possibility is a data bus fault...
A good Ford specific scan tool will pull some codes on this. You may get lucky and find that one or two modules have logged low bat codes, and that would point to where in the wiring to look.

 

[LS6_5SPD]

I remember when I installed an aftermarket alternator, from time to time all of my needles would go all the way up, then all the way down, then back to normal. Odo never did anything weird. Then I got a new OEM alt. and never got that issue again.