Mice disable vehicle!

[Jeremy airjer W]

I showed up for work yesterday and found a work order for a ford van that wouldn't idle. Sure enough it would start, run horribly, and then stall. Working the gas pedal made no difference and there was no check engine light on. The first thing I thought of was part A in last weeks Whats Thats?, The MAF sensor. I opened the hood and unplugged the MAF then tried to start it again. This time it idled, I must be heading in the right direction. I pulled it in the shop and removed the air filter housing to inspect the MAF and this is what I found.

Mice had chewed up the paper air filter until there was a hole in it. The hole allowed pieces of the air filter to get stuck in the MAF sensor.

If air cannot flow through this part it doesn't work and the vehicle will not run!

The fix was to remove the debris from the MAF and replace the air filter. Once everything was back together the vehicle ran great. How often can you leave a shop after having your vehicle towed in and have the repairs done for under $20?

[Scott K]

Yep those little critters like air boxes for some reason, alot of times you find a gallon pale of dog food, or nuts in there as well. Another one of their favorite spots is under the intake plenum. There they have a bunch of wires to sharpen their teeth on as well

[MIKE IN lINO III]

With that in mind.... how do you keep them out of there??

My diesel sits for weeks at a time, let alone all of the other gas powered toys.

Mike

[Scott K]

Dont keep food around it, moth balls help a little bit.

[walleyeaddict]

!@#$%^& Mice!!

[echotrail]

Go to a natural food or health food store and get a bottle of "Oil of Peppermint" and a bag of cotton balls. Put 4 or 5 drops of the stuff on a cotton ball and set it where you need to. They hate the smell.

[Jeremy airjer W]

Who knew? I might have to reccomend that to some customers and see if it works.

[john.wells]

supposedly they hate scented fabric softener sheets as well. I have never tried it, but heard it works. One of the biggest things I have found is keep a clean cab. I used to let the fast food bags and candy wrappers pile up. Also, I won't eat sunflower seeds or other nuts in my truck any more, nor will I let anyone else. If a fry drops between the seat folds, I make sure to get it out. Doing all this has helped quite a bit, but now that I mentioned this I will probably find more of the little buggers.

[BobT]

Couple years ago my neighbor and I were trying to start his combine in preparation for the coming harvest but couldn't turn the engine over. We verified that the starter was getting power but it was as if the motor had seized up. We finally discovered that mice or moles had invaded his engine. They managed to get into some of the cylinders and build their nests. since the air filter seemed okay and the fact that he didn't have an exhaust cover we surmised that they got in through the exhaust manifold and entered through open valves.

Bob

[Jeremy airjer W]

Thats crazy Bob!

[zamboni]

Don't mice have collapsible rib cages so they can get into about any sized hole?

[john.wells]

I don't know if THEY have the ability to collapse their rib cages, but I know for sure that I do! I do know that they can squeeze through some pretty tight spots.

[mr walleye]

A mouse can squeeze through a 1/2" hole and a rat can go through

a 3/4" hole. just a little something to think about when sealing up a house.

[Jeremy airjer W]

I had another one last night. Except this time there where really fine mouse hairs stuck to the MAF. The complaint was hesitates on intitial acceleration and check engine light. The codes where both banks lean P0171 and P0174, and a random cylinder misfire P0300. I also found the PCV breather tube disconnected from the air snorkel which will skew the MAF readings also.

[Scott K]

I had a complaint last week with blower motor inop intermittenly, and a bad smell, well it worked ok for 15 minutes then could smell something, the mouse had bitten through the wire for the blower motor and was shorting through the mouse to ground, he was cooked!

[Jeremy airjer W]

LOL, Thats Awesome!!!

[Shack]

Once I had a guy with an early nineties Ford 2 wheel drive F-150, with a manual trans in it. This was 5 or so years ago and the truck had very lows miles and was in great shape. Well, it sat in a detached garage most of the time.

Well, chipmunks got into the bell housing and made a pretty good sized nest, which in turn cause such a concern, it burnt the clutch out. Well, the guy paid for his new clutch, pressure plate, turning of the fly wheel and some other items they destroyed to make their nest. O.k. strange, but you live out in the country what can you do.

Well, low and behold one plus years later, same truck comes in, with same issues. Turns out to be the same thing.

He paid for the same repair over again, plus the installation of wire mesh that we machine screwed on inside of bell housing.

As far as I know he never had another issue.

The guy was from Big Lake and did appraisals of homes for a living. Nice guy and good customer.

[Scott K]

Shack, believe it or not your house insurance will pay for mice damage on your vehicle!

[Shack]

4wanderingeyes,

I do think that was brought up by the customer, because it was parked inside of structure. Since you brought this up, I might have even been involved with an adjuster and returned the old parts back to customer. It was a relatively long time ago (loss of brain cells), but I think he did file a claim. Now if he went threw with it I do not know.

[Jeremy airjer W]

I'll have to keep the insurance claim in mind if we ever run into more substantial repairs!

[Shack]

Ya Jeremy.

The adjusters can be a pain, but insurance adjusters (IMO) are better at doing the right repair, verses an aftermarket warranty adjuster. I will go further, home owners insurance adjusters are even better to deal with than automotive insurance adjusters, when it come to handling claims for a vehicles. They come out, take a couple snap shots, you give them a estimate of repairs and they send a check to the customer.

This is what I have come to find out over the years. Automotive insurance, the deductibles are most likely low, but filing a claim raises your monthly rates. Home owners insurance most times holds a larger deductible, but from what I learned, filing a claim will not raise your rates. If you have a $5000.00 plus repair needed, caused by a possibly coverable issue, I would hit home owners first.