Door ajar light stays on

[maso1888]

Hello, I have a 2013 Transit connect that has a few issues. It's in great shape, only 66,xxx miles at the time of posting, however I am having a few issues with it. The main issue is that the door ajar light stays on most of the time even though all doors are closed, which causes the doors to stay unlocked and not be able to be locked. I have narrowed it down to the rear barn doors, I believe some kind of sensor is faulty in them. If I do want the doors to lock I have to keep opening and closing the rear doors until by chance the sensor acknowledges the doors are closed, allowing me to lock it. I do a lot of hauling and park in areas with a lot of homeless, so not being able to secure my cargo safely when I'm not around is a big problem for me. Where is this sensor located? How would I go about repairing it? I would like to do it myself if it's possible.

[tombea]

I apologize for not being able to help, but I have the same issue, only with the driver's door. Maybe somebody knows where the sensors are located?

[Cheri]

I've had my 2012 for 5+ years and that same problem for 5+ years. One bandaid that has worked for me is a good spray of electronic contact cleaner into the door at the latch. Not a permanent fix but has temporarily allowed me to get the locks to work and that dreaded door ajar light off. Good luck. I'll be watching this forum in case someone else has a true fix. 

[Fifty150]

Not a real fix...... But here are some ideas.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[lowspeedpursuit]

My driver's front stopped locking reliably last month, and it seemed to be the ajar switch since the dome light would also come on randomly until you slammed the door a few times.

 

You can pull the latch / lock actuator out, take it apart, and clean the ajar detection switch with electronics cleaner, which stopped my light from coming on, but in my case the locks didn't actually start working any better. It's kind of hard to explain without pictures, so I'll post some when I have a weekend free, but basically there's a bellcrank that physically actuates the lock, and it can be gear-driven by the electronic locks, or pushed manually by the driver's lock switch via cable.

 

There's a rotary spring on top of one gear that returns the bellcrank to a neutral position after locking or unlocking. When this spring wears out, the bellcrank stays at the end of its travel, with the geartrain tight against the motor for the electronic locks. The lock system struggles to overcome this tension, so the locks "don't work" the next time you try them.

 

 

Long story short, the latch / lock actuator in 1st-gens is massively overcomplicated and will eventually break down for one reason or another, and costs a small fortune to replace. Rockauto has SMP DLAxxx aftermarket replacements for ~$200 instead of Ford's ~$400, and right now there's limited stock on sale for ~$140.

 

Whenever this comes up, I would clean the ajar switch (or manual bypass if that sounds like too much work), but with the understanding that the entire actuator might not be long for this world.