Gas pedal sticks. Cruise control randomly turns itself on vehicle accelerates on it's own without warning. Have had to shut the car off or shift into neutral while driving. It's absolutely terrifying.
2005 Mercury Sable: adaptive cruise control problems
13 of the 83 complaints about the 2005 Mercury Sable describe adaptive cruise control problems.
- owner complaints
- 13
- of this car's complaints
- 16%
- typical mileage
- 73,500
- recalls
- 0
Is there a fix? No recall or service bulletin covers this area of the car yet.
Adaptive cruise control problems by model year
What owners say
My 2005 mercury sable suddenly had the cruise control stop working approximately 30 days ago. The next day some serious issues began to happen. I was traveling down a curvy 4 lane road at the posted speed limit of 45mph. Knowing there was an up coming light I took my foot off the brake and anticipated the normal deceleration. Suddenly rather than slowing down my engine independently revved up to 3/4 RPM causing me to instantly jump to 50/55 MPH. Apart from the immediate panic I have never had a vehicle react in this manner and was at a loss for what to do. I hit the brakes extremely hard to combat the acceleration while putting the car into neutral (still going 40+ MPH). Despite having the car in neutral it was still revving itself at around 3 RPM. After slowing down to a safe speed I turned into a parking lot and immediately turned the car off. I left the car resting for about minutes and when started again, it immediately began revving the same as before. I am very concerned and have been since troubleshooting with my mechanic. This is clearly a very dangerous issue and significantly lowers my mpg while putting triple the stress on my brakes.
While driving recently, my 2005 sable suddenly accelerated, forcing me to brake and put the car in neutral while at speed. This has happened 3 or 4 other times.in the past. Now the cruise control does not work anymore.
Got onto express way and tried to set cruise control at 70 MPH. Cruise control wouldn't maintain speed, so I shut off. Got off of express way to a 40 MPH zone. Took foot off of brakes, and car was accelerating to 60 MPH. In park 4000 rpms. Incident has occurred 4 times in the past 3 days. Until this time, I never had any problems. Now it will randomly kick on at any point in time (hour into driving, five minutes, 3 hours etc.) cannot get to shut off when it occurs. Have not used cruise control option since 1st incident. Does not stop if you shut car off and turn back on.
My car has accelerated without application of the throttle. I did not have cruise control on or engaged and the car continued to function as if the gas pedal was depressed. This has happened on several occasions now. Once, while at a speed of about 30 MPH, I was able to safely pull over and put the car in neutral. The engine rpms continued to race upward as if the car was under load and under throttle input. There were no floor mats or any other obstacles or objects making contact with any controls or devices.
Driving the vehicle at about 30 MPH. The car accelerated to about 60 MPH at which time I was riding the brakes the entire time till I could pull over. The engine goes to 4000 RPM while in park. If restarted its the same thing. This was happening off and on. I took to garage and they cleaned and checked carburetor and fuel pump. It continued again and I finally took it in again. This time they changes the cruise control cable. Again, it continued again and I finally took it to the dealership which they replaced the gasket. And again I am still having problems with the vehicle. I would love to sell this car and get a new one, but I cant afford it. I was hoping to be able to give this car to my 16 year old daughter, but that is totally out of the question as I do not feel the car is safe to be driving. I also can not afford to be taking this vehicle in the shop and paying for parts that just don't seem to be working. Please look in to this matter as I believe their are many people out there in my same situation, but have not taken action as they just give up. The last thing we need is for people to get injured or die from this problem.
While driving the vehicle in neighborhood situations or other situations the vehicle accelerates on its own beyond the on the desired speed this causes the car to be difficult to control and very difficult to stop increases the stopping distance needed to avoid an accident to stop at a red light or stop sign it also causes the engine to race even when placed in neutral. Recently why stop at a stop sign the car was pushing it south forward so hard I had a hard time keeping it stop and it actually moved me beyond the stop sign into a oncoming traffic. Extremely dangerous situation there will b fatalities if this is not corrected. This spontaneous acceleration even allows me to drive up hills without having my foot placed on the gas car will not slow down or stop easily. This started in march and it's happening everyday causing wear and tear on the brakes it makes it difficult to steer and I am in fear while driving. I've now started to drive with the brakes on 100 percent of the time in order to keep the car at a controllable speed I've read other complaints on mine similar to this I believe it's a known issue and I'm hoping for a speedy recall by ford to correct the cause. Since this is a known issue and and I think they linked it to either the accelerator cables or the cruise control .while driving in neighborhood traffic at 25 miles an hour the car can accelerate above 50 very dangerous!!!!!!
Vehicle maintained and accelerated speeds while on level ground with no cruise control engaged and foot off of the pedal. Depressing the brake slowed the car down, however rpms were still pushing 3.5x1000 according to the instrument panel. Turning cruise control on/off seemed to fix it. Upon starting the engine, car idles extremely high upwards of 2.75-3.00x1000 RPM's. Turned cruise control on and off then I heard a click...then power cycled the engine and normal RPM's since. However cruise control does not work anymore.
Car suddenly accelerated. I traveling under 30 MPH car began accelerating on it's own! I braked and RPM's continued rev-ving at 3000. Put car in neutral- did not stop rev ving. Placed in park- same thing. Turned it off- same thing when the light turned green I put the car in drive and it peeled away. At that time I tapped the gas and the problem corrected itself. This was the third incident of sudden acceleration. First time in june of 2012- my mechanic cleaned the throttle. However, this time I took it to a ford dealership and the culprit was a broken cruise control cable. Ford/mercury needs to warn consumers to get the cruise control cables checked! Can provide documentation from the dealership if needed.
Throttle was randomly sticking upon acceleration; problem became progressively worse and was reproducible at times. On one occasion car was stopped via brake and shifted into park while engine continued to run at 4,000 RPM. Brought car to dealer on 12/02/2010; problem was diagnosed and described as "cruise control cable holding throttle open." dealer replaced part with part no. Yf1z-9a825-ca. (problem was reproducible without any use of cruise control system.) no problems with throttle sticking occurred until approximately 5/20/2012 ( 95,600 mileage) when same behavior began to recur at freeway speeds though without the cruise control being used.
Tl* the contact owns a 2005 mercury sable. The contact stated that the accelerator pedal would become stuck sporadically and would cause the vehicle to accelerate abnormally. The contact believed the failure was caused by the cruise control because the failure would only occur when the cruise control cable was disconnected. When the failure would occur, the contact would shift into neutral to stop the failure. The vehicle had not been inspected. The failure mileage was unknown, but the current mileage was 89,000.
The cruise control cable went loose from the throttle and my can accelerated without my pushing on the gas pedal. It was very dangerous to drive.
Related recalls
No recalls on record for this model year.
Questions about the 2005 Mercury Sable adaptive cruise
Is adaptive cruise control problems a common problem on the 2005 Mercury Sable?
13 of 83 owner complaints about the 2005 Mercury Sable (16%) mention adaptive cruise control problems. The model year with the most reports is 2002.
Is there a recall or service bulletin for this on the 2005 Mercury Sable?
There is no recall or service bulletin for this area of the car on record.
Other symptoms on the 2005 Mercury Sable
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