On the morning of Oct 27th, shortly after pulling out of my driveway, my 2015 F150 made a hard “clunky” shift to 2nd gear and lost almost all acceleration/power. I pulled into a side street, looked for obvious issues, turned it off and restarted it. At that time the check engine light came on and the lack of power continued. Something had caused it to go into “limp” mode.

My neighbor put his scanner on it and came back with a Fuel Pressure sensor error, said it should be an easy fix. With a touch over 50K miles, I was relieved thinking it would be under the power train warranty.

Unfortunately this morning was the earliest the dealer could get it in to look at so I am already almost two weeks into a rental car. Talking to the dealer, they don’t do loaners past 3 years/36K even for warranty work.


A couple hours after dropping it off I get a call that there is RODENT damage on the fuel system wiring harness, not covered under warranty and I am looking at a $1000 repair and they will need it for a week. Great, with rental car that means about $1350 for repairs, less than a month after paying it off


I text my neighbor to see if he thinks it is legit (my cynicism thinking the dealer might “fake” it to avoid eating warranty work) and he says it happens all the time BUT my insurance should cover it.

Well, that was news to me and I would never have even thought about that being a possibility.


So I call insurance (USAA) and was EXTREMELY well served. Helpful, friendly, empathetic, etc. Claim gets started and assigned to an adjuster. When I tell her I had already given the shop the go ahead on repairs she said they need to wait for the appraiser to come inspect vehicle, but may be a day or two before adjuster contacts me.

She then transfers me to someone else to expedite and get an adjuster involved today, cool. I talk to them and they get it all going to arrange for a field appraiser. Somewhere along the line I mention having a rental car and they say I am covered for that as well.

She put me on hold to call the local Enterprise rental office and assume the rental car I picked up on 10/28. Get that all taken care of, oh - and they cover a full size “standard” car, not the puny econo-box I was renting to try and stay in budget, so tomorrow morning I trade the crappy car for a full size.

While I am on the phone finishing with her, call waiting hits and I answer it to find the originally assigned adjuster calling me to start the process. I explain I am already working someone and we disconnect, going back to the expedited adjuster lady.


Get all finished in about 30 minutes including call back to dealer to tell them not to do anything until field appraiser comes out on Tuesday.

Good news, all I will be out is my $250 Comp deductible - less than what I was going to be into for the rental car!

Should have the truck back late next week, they are also going to do the two recalls on it while they have it so I get that off the “to do” list as well.


Going to take some of the money I saved and invest in some rodent traps to put around the parking area. Hopefully the little bastards die a slow painful death!


I know that USAA seems to get bashed occasionally on here, but I have been nothing but satisfied with them.

This message has been edited. Last edited by: 911Boss,

I see a fair amount of rodent damage to cars and their wiring. They are apparently attracted to soy in the insulation. If the damage is just a couple of wires I'll splice them with heat-shrink butt connectors, but if there is a lot of damage or the wire is bitten off too close to a connector, a wiring harness is the best - or only - option. (Ford and GM are actually pretty good about making connectors available, but Chrysler and foreign makes are not.) Besides the harnesses themselves being complex, they go everywhere, including inside bodies or around, over, under or through engine components, so I can easily see a $1000 repair.

Rodents can also be a nuisance even if they don't actually eat anything. Just the other day I had an older Jeep Grand Cherokee in. The airbox, under the filter, was half filled with what looked like corn and dog/cat food, and two of them got into the coolant reservoir (the cap was missing) and were drowned/poisoned. The "best" one was a blower motor making noise due to a dead mouse - its face shredded off by the fan blades - in the housing.

So should I put traps in the engine compartment as well?

I haven’t seen the damage in person or by pics, so don’t know how extensive it is.

Dealer said they need to replace “harness” and that the manifold has to come off so gaskets needed as well.

Why would they use soy in the insulation???

quote:

Dealer said they need to replace “harness” and that the manifold has to come off so gaskets needed as well.

This is very probable. It might, either wholly or partially, run under the intake manifold, and many harnesses also have a hard plastic sheath so you can't bend them to go around components.

quote:

Why would they use soy in the insulation???

Apparently, to make it biodegradable/recyclable.
https://www4.bing.com/search?q...47E6934F443E7043DA22

quote:

Originally posted by egregore:

Apparently, to make it biodegradable/recyclable.

Call me old fashioned, but I’d prefer my motor vehicles NOT be “biodegradable”!

I left USAA last April over a terrible auto insurance claim experience after 30 years with them. Glad it works out for some people.

This is actually becoming a very big issue.
There were a couple lawsuits filed against Toyota but were dismissed.

Father in laws Tundra got the underhood fuse box and main harness twice. Luckily he was able to splice and repair the harness both times. Fuse box replaced twice he did the work himself so he is just over $200.

I had not heard about insurance covering it. Guess I’ll give my insurance a call to see if they cover it.

quote:

Originally posted by egregore:

blower motor making noise due to a dead mouse - its face shredded off by the fan blades - in the housing.

I had the same thing in my GMC 3500 delivery truck. When not in use, the truck is parked at Our Little Airport, which is adjacent to farm fields. When the temperature drops, outside vehicles, as well as hangars, are invaded by field mice seeking shelter from the cold. Mouse had somehow gotten into the blower motor. We discovered it when the "stench of death" invaded the cab when the blower motor was turned on.

That's a nice surprise - might be good to get your neighbor a case or bottle of his favorite for the money he saved you.

I've only had one claim with USAA since I've been with them for many years now. It was a homeowner's claim and everything was done with check in hand in about a week. No problems whatsoever and I was very satisfied.

Regarding rodents in vehicles, I've had some minor damage by mice, but since I started putting little Ramik poison bars in my battery compartments, I haven't had any issues.

Chipmunks on the other hand. I had one get caught in my serpentine belt one day and throw it. I'd made it about halfway down the driveway when it stopped. At the time I had a broken wrist and wasn't able to put it back on myself. Had to have a mechanic come out and put it back on for me.

WHY we always have 2-3 cats on the Ranch. We suffer rodent damage every 2 years or so. One gets by the cats and takes up residence in either a vehicle or one of the mowers/tractors. PITA!

Last incident was with the 17 Camaro SS. That cost me my $500 deductible. Total bill was around $900.

quote:

Originally posted by 911Boss:
So should I put traps in the engine compartment as well?

I haven’t seen the damage in person or by pics, so don’t know how extensive it is.

Dealer said they need to replace “harness” and that the manifold has to come off so gaskets needed as well.

Why would they use soy in the insulation???

Because "green." And tasty.

I had the same thing in my leased BMW 335i.

Cost $4,700 to replace the entire wiring harness.

USAA covered it without a squawk.

Now, why on earth BMW would make wiring insulation out of rat food, is another issue. Supposedly European envieonmental regulations pushed car manufacturers to make more of the car out of bio degradable materials, so soy or peanut oil is an ingredient in wiring harness.

During the harvest season my Lexus will get left by grain bins and sure enough some type of rodent gnawed into the passenger seat wiring harness. It took a day at the dealer and $1200 to replace that harness. My insurance covered all but the deductible. The unknown rodent was never seen again.

Epilogue...

Repair complete, simple and easy. USAA covered a rental from the day it started to the day of pick up.

One minor glitch, but it is on the local contracted appraiser that USAA hired to go and do the appraisal. He used a labor rate of $65/hr where the Ford Dealership charges $150/hr. On a 5.5 hour job, that works out to a $500+ difference after tax.

Understanding that a dealership is probably going to be charging higher than the “average” that’s seemed way off. Turns out $65 is the average for body work, not mechanical. Once I pointed it out, they agreed and adjusted accordingly, covering the entire $150/hr dealership rate.


Still very happy with USAA, and after the last round of USAA smack talking, I checked other company’s rates and no one came close.

The older Son was away at college and had a strange mouse issue, inside the vehicle. He drove it almost daily but was parked near some longer grass.

He caught at least one inside with a glue trap I think. The epicenter for his event was behind the glovebox, in and around the cabin air filter.

I’d put some effort to making sure they are out if the vehicle, sorta likely with repair work being done. Then I would evaluate where you are parked most of the time. If in a garage I would do the poison routine, inside a pet proof ‘bait house’.

As others have said, its the soy in the wire coating.

My dad had an 06 Chevy Duramax. He had to put that thing in the shop 3 different times (in a 4 month span) over this. Something was chewing the wires up that went to the computer. The truck would only drive in limp mode.

He said he zip tied some rat poison near the wires. I guess it worked, he didnt have any more issues after that.

He got a new truck a couple years ago. They havent touched it yet. Not sure if the factory changed the wire coating or it was just one rodent doing the damage.