My gripes with Ford Motor Co

[Chris142]

Oh while I'm rambing lets not forget about the Pinto. The cam comes out the rear of the head and they ate cams. You either pull the head or drill a hole in the firewall big enough to get the cam through.

The 460 uses an oil cooler in the lower radiator hose. You can't replace the hose between the cooler and Water pump w/o removing the w/p...........And once you remove the pump then the timing cover to block gasket leaks so a 20 minute job turns into an all day job.

1st gen Taurus PS hoses, reciever dryers and the line thats part of them, Excursion lower hoses w/o a clamp....Can't get that off in the truck, flying spark plugs.........LOL Ok I'm done rambling.

 

[PT1]

Originally Posted By: Bluestream

Get the bean-counters out of the marketing dept. and let the engineers built the trucks they want. Need to stop worrying about the share price and stock options.


This is not even reality....all public corporations fund their operations by selling stock at a high price. Would you pay $75,000 for an F-150?

 

[Nick R]

All the gauges on our expedition except for the oil pressure are real gauges. Sure they don't have numbers, but if you are running on AUX and push all the window up/down buttons, turn on the blower, lights etc, the gauges moves ever so slightly. The oil pressure never changes. All the gauges on the jeep, and my car work. It annoys me because the temp on my car fluctuates between "normal" and "almost but not quite to the hot mark" depending on if I've been sitting at a stop light or something.

 

[Falcon_LS]

Originally Posted By: oldmaninsc
Really? That may be true on the town car, but did you see what Falcon LS posted from the owner's manual?

"To reset the oil monitoring system to 100 percent after each oil change (approximately 5,000 miles (8,000 km or 180 days) perform the following . . . "


The quote in the manual is only there to support Ford's 5,000 mile/6 month OCI recommendation. In the real world, the OLM goes much further, as OVERK1ILL has mentioned.

 

[mechanicx]

GM vehicles are hard to work on but Fords just might take the hard to work on prize. Ford is historically known to be the one of biggest penny pincher. They use to charge you extra for clear coat and didn't even galvanize body panels on some models for instance.

What's funny is in some respects Ford was right with or ahead of chevrolet and other GM divisions until the 50's. Now they are repeating that. Funny how things are sort of cyclical.

I think the GM OLM is the real deal. It's calibrated to the particular engine, taking into account the driving cycle and based on extensive testing.

 

[Dualie]

I wish they would just make its an option that could be enabled with a scan tool. just enable real guages.

 

[Bluestream]

Originally Posted By: PT1
Originally Posted By: Bluestream

Get the bean-counters out of the marketing dept. and let the engineers built the trucks they want. Need to stop worrying about the share price and stock options.


This is not even reality....all public corporations fund their operations by selling stock at a high price. Would you pay $75,000 for an F-150?


My point was mgmt wants to show profit on the bottom line to please investors and drive stock price higher. Often to the point of cutting cost of the vehicle by using cheap parts and/or quality. This is a short sighted strategy, but can be profitable for anyone with stock options. Worked well for Rick Wagner who allowed GM to lose 80 Billion dollars and end up where they are today

 

[firemachine69]

Originally Posted By: bretfraz
I went to a car show today in Freezelanta and there was a beautiful 1963 Impala with a 409. It was fully restored and the owner had just bought it. He started it for me and I noticed something on the dash I had not seen since I was a kid - a COLD light. When the engine is cold, a light comes on and tells you. When the engine gets to a certain temp, the light goes out. Just above it is a HOT light.

The only gauges the car had was a fuel gauge and a huge speedometer. Everything else was idiot lights, including the COLD light.

Idiots lights have been around for decades, and I'm sure will be around longer still.




My Yaris has that.

On that note, it doesn't have a temp gauge, either (cold light, hot light, and nothing on for "normal" conditions). 'Yota figured out a while back that gauges were useless for 95% of the buying sheeple. I tend to agree.

 

[cousincletus]

I'm not the biggest fan of Ford. I have all GM cars now and prefer them to Ford.
Examples of the GMs I have vs. similar Fords:
Malibu vs. Fusion- Malibu has more domestic parts, and is assembled here.
Impala vs Crown Vic: Impala has FWD, which gets better gas mileage and goes better in snow. Both cars have proven reliability, though.
Colorado vs. Ranger- No comparison. Colorado is a newer design, had decent room, more power, not much difference in price.

For reliability, I'll take GM any day. This is due to personal experience, so very subjective.
These are the reasons why I picked GM over Ford, so opinions may vary.

 

[tig1]

Don't forget the Crown Vic isn't assembled here(US) either. Yet the CV and is a great car.

 

[Bluestream]

Originally Posted By: tig1
Don't forget the Crown Vic isn't assembled here(US) either. Yet the CV and is a great car.


What differnce does it make where it's assembled?

Side note: I was in a Crown Vic cab last night and it had 530,000KM on it. I asked driver how often it gets an oil change, but he didn't know

 

[JHZR2]

Originally Posted By: bretfraz
I went to a car show today in Freezelanta and there was a beautiful 1963 Impala with a 409. It was fully restored and the owner had just bought it. He started it for me and I noticed something on the dash I had not seen since I was a kid - a COLD light. When the engine is cold, a light comes on and tells you. When the engine gets to a certain temp, the light goes out. Just above it is a HOT light.

The only gauges the car had was a fuel gauge and a huge speedometer. Everything else was idiot lights, including the COLD light.

Idiots lights have been around for decades, and I'm sure will be around longer still.


lots of small rental cars Ive driven recently have cold lights. Th last gen BMW M3 has a tech that increases with engine temp - effectively a cold light too. I like it.

 

[JHZR2]

Originally Posted By: eljefino
VW TDI stripper models came with "cold" lights in lieu of temp gauges. If I paid several grand extra for that fancy powertrain I'd want to keep an eye on it.


not to go too ot, but is this the case with current models?

 

[mechanicx]

Originally Posted By: Bluestream
Originally Posted By: tig1
Don't forget the Crown Vic isn't assembled here(US) either. Yet the CV and is a great car.


What differnce does it make where it's assembled?

Side note: I was in a Crown Vic cab last night and it had 530,000KM on it. I asked driver how often it gets an oil change, but he didn't know


The difference it makes to me besides any possible quality issue is if I'm going to pay the same price for a vehicle anyway, I'd rather some of that cost go into reinvesting in my own countries economy labor force instead of in some other country's and into profits.

 

[johnd]

I had a number of Ford trucks and vans that were ok but I never cared that much for Ford automobiles. While we are on the subject of gauges, Fords are notorious for having speedometers that show too fast and odometers that show too many miles.

 

[OVERKILL]

Originally Posted By: mechanicx
Originally Posted By: Bluestream
Originally Posted By: tig1
Don't forget the Crown Vic isn't assembled here(US) either. Yet the CV and is a great car.


What differnce does it make where it's assembled?

Side note: I was in a Crown Vic cab last night and it had 530,000KM on it. I asked driver how often it gets an oil change, but he didn't know


The difference it makes to me besides any possible quality issue is if I'm going to pay the same price for a vehicle anyway, I'd rather some of that cost go into reinvesting in my own countries economy labor force instead of in some other country's and into profits.


They are assembled up here in Canada. We are far from some sort of third world sweat shop........

And a large portion of your GM trucks and the new Camaro are made up here as well.

 

[Falcon_LS]

The Crown Vic and Impala and both manufactured in Canada. I'm also going to have to disagree with the Impala being 'better' in snow because of front wheel drive.

Back in the days when nearly all cars were rear wheel drive, people were able to drive around in vehicles that haven't even got a fraction of the gadgets today's vehicles have. Modern cars cannot suddenly become less capable in snow compared to something out of the 1960's. Today, people are just so dependent on technological advancements like traction control and whatnot to cover up their lack of skill. And those driving 4WD's suddenly think they own the road because of 4WD. You may disagree, this is just an opinion.

 

[hone eagle]

As we wander off into FWD vs RWD debating I just wanna say - GAUGES we dont need no stinkin GAUGES! -

 

[HM12460]

all i got to say is i like my ford. i like my chevy too.

 

[mechanicx]

Originally Posted By: OVERK1LL
Originally Posted By: mechanicx
Originally Posted By: Bluestream
Originally Posted By: tig1
Don't forget the Crown Vic isn't assembled here(US) either. Yet the CV and is a great car.


What differnce does it make where it's assembled?

Side note: I was in a Crown Vic cab last night and it had 530,000KM on it. I asked driver how often it gets an oil change, but he didn't know


The difference it makes to me besides any possible quality issue is if I'm going to pay the same price for a vehicle anyway, I'd rather some of that cost go into reinvesting in my own countries economy labor force instead of in some other country's and into profits.


They are assembled up here in Canada. We are far from some sort of third world sweat shop........

And a large portion of your GM trucks and the new Camaro are made up here as well.


I don't really have anything against the Canada manufacturing. Ford and GM have a long history of manufacturing there. Canada for a long time until recently was like traveling to another state from here. To a lesser extent I don't have much against a car being manufactured in Mexico. I mostly don't like vehicles manufactured overseas. I was just expolaining why I'd prefer one that is manufactured in the USA.