Wires cut to keyless keypad break tailgate?

Tiny
TJMEEHAN
  • MEMBER
  • 2018 FORD EXPLORER
  • 3.7L
  • 6 CYL
  • TURBO
  • 4WD
  • AUTOMATIC
  • 48,000 MILES
During a road trip with our vehicle listed above Sport, the trim piece that houses the Ford keypad keyless entry came off and was hanging only by the 6 small wires. We had no tools and were on the side of the freeway, so I made the stupid decision to just cut the wires to detach the piece. This caused our tailgate to no longer work (no way to open or close it, even manually), the rear climate controls to no longer function, the "tailgate ajar" warning to always be on, and the interior lights to not shut off until 10 minutes later. Our Ford dealer charged me almost $700 to replace the keypad and reprogram it. Then, they charged me another $1,100 to replace the tailgate controller saying it was shorted out by the incident. Now, they still cannot get the electronics to work and want to charge me more labor for all the time they have spent troubleshooting the issue. Are they just not competent?
Thursday, March 27th, 2025 AT 8:47 AM

7 Replies

Tiny
KEN L
  • MASTER CERTIFIED MECHANIC
  • 51,541 POSTS
It could be, have they done a CAN scan? I would do that first to see what codes have been set. You can get a CAN scanner (Controller Area Network) which will work on most cars from Amazon.

here is a video to show you how:

https://youtu.be/u-4syLc-ifQ

Let me know if they have any codes so I can help them fix it.

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Thursday, March 27th, 2025 AT 11:45 AM
Tiny
TJMEEHAN
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Thank you, Ken. I appreciate your quick response. The lead mechanic at my dealer has said that there was a short in the system, so I'm assuming they used a CAN scanner to identify this, but I don't know for sure. He also said that cutting these wires to the keyless entry keypad shorted out both the power liftgate control module and the body control module (for a total of $3000 in repairs). Is that possible? Could cutting these wires actually cause that damage?
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Thursday, March 27th, 2025 AT 1:17 PM
Tiny
KEN L
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I don't think so, the keypad is directly wired to the BCM so I am not sure what they are talking about. Did they check fuse #11 5 amp on the BCM? This is the only thing I can find that could have shorted. So for yourself in the wiring diagrams for the keypad below. Check out the images (below).
Images (Click to make bigger)
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+1
Friday, March 28th, 2025 AT 10:05 AM
Tiny
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Wow, Ken, thank you. This is amazing sleuthing. Again, I appreciate your help on this. This gives me some good evidence to go back to them and make sure they are not replacing expensive components that do not need to be replaced.
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Friday, March 28th, 2025 AT 11:21 AM
Tiny
KEN L
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Yep, they do that sometimes to make quotas. Have a good weekend ;)
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Friday, March 28th, 2025 AT 12:06 PM
Tiny
TJMEEHAN
  • MEMBER
  • 4 POSTS
Ken L, you were right all along. It was a fuse and none of those controllers had to be replaced. You saved me a ton of money. Thank you!
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Friday, April 4th, 2025 AT 4:47 AM
Tiny
KEN L
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You are welcome, glad we got it fixed. Would you please consider helping us keep the site going by using our GoFundMe or PAY PAL page?

https://gofund.me/c7d318ad or

https://www.paypal.com/ncp/payment/VTBAJSABCQ2CN

If not, we understand, can you please leave us a rating?

https://g.page/r/CZdEnyCkGgm6EB0/review

and

https://www.sitejabber.com/reviews/2carpros.com

Have a great weekend :)
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Friday, April 4th, 2025 AT 10:30 AM

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