A Venting Thread!!!! FORD SUCKS!!!

[DGXSER]

So my sister ask me to look at her Escape as every now and then when she turns the key she gets nothing, but after repeated attempts it starts. Sooo, starter shopping we go. Found the starter and got it and the car home.

Start to pull the starter. Found it easy enough. Two bolts hold it in place, no problem, had the starter off the engine in about 20 minutes. Now the fun begins!!

In order to get it out, you have to pull the heater hoses loose, which of course requires draining the coolant down. So I get a bucket cleaned up so I can reuse the fluid, and go to drain the coolant. Well, after pulling all the stupid splash pans off the bottom of the car (I think they want it to look like an off road vehicle with skid plates......made of plastic....that I can bend with two fingers .... So much protection added here!!!) which adds another 30 minutes to the job. Only now I still have to look and feel to finally find the flippin drain....hidden behind the transmission coolant lines. So you can barely manipulate a pliers in to place to open the bloody drain. (yes by this time I am hatin on FORD!!!) Even then I can barely get a gallon to drain out. I know there is more in there, but it will not drain.

So I finally said F' the SOB, and pulled the coolant lines loose with a drain pan under the car. Coolant blows out the manifold line, and now I can finally move the lines and still battle to get the dang thing out around brake lines and transmission shift linkage cable. then have the fun of doing it all in reverse, and cycling the stupid engine over and over to refill the coolant through the overflow tank. It would be way to costly to put a bloody cap on the radiator of course!!

So, once again, a 30 minute job of getting the part removed and reinstalled becomes a 3-1/2 hour job to get the part out and back into place. And people wonder why I so enjoy working on these bikes instead!!

[bikerphil]

Hehe, bet you can get it down to 2 hrs next time . These cars nowdays are designed to go straight to a shop for repairs, lol. Sorry for your pain, brother. Hope the problem is fixed.

[fredintoon]

Hi DGXSER,
it ain't just Ford, it's all of them.
Things I've seen personally.
Toyota 4x4 you gotta drop the steering to pull the starter.
Unless you want to drop the tranny bolts on a Chevy Vega with the V8 option to tilt the engine back you gotta knock the ceramics off the rear two sparkplugs and turn the bases with a box-end wrench to get them out because a plug socket won't clear the bodywork. (You spin the new ones in finger tight and hope they carbon up tight enough not to leak.)
And it ain't just modern cars,
Seems on one model of 1930s Bugatti the procedure to change the clutch started with removing the rear lights.

[stevestrom]

My dads a diesel injection tech and he was saying that on some of the new trucks (chev, I believe) they have to lift the cab to take the injectors out!

[crazy steve]

Hi DGXSER,
it ain't just Ford, it's all of them...

The new vehicles are different kettle of fish entirely...

Neighbors SUV that has blown-up three EGR valves (to the tune of $143 each) and fouled two cat convertors ($160 each) due to an electronics glitch nobody can track down...

Another that replaced the front struts to the tune of over $1200 (actually cheaply done at a local shop; the dealer wanted over $2K)..

My personal tale is SWMBO's sh!tbox had the wipers quit working recently, and seeing how it's the rainy season here she was understandingly upset. It seems a snapped-in plastic bushing/retainer wore out, allowing the drive arm to fall off the linkage. No biggy I think; WRONG!! Seems you can't buy the bushing, only the complete linkage assembly... $181. Being the cheap bastard I am, I looked for an alternative and found out that Dorman makes these bushings for many models. After searching their product line, of course they don't make one for her particular model, but they've got one that looks close, so I give it a try. I got lucky; with minor mods, it fit and worked, for a repair cost of $8. Dorman makes these 'factory available only as an assembly' bushings for all domestic manufacturers as well as most of the imports, so nearly all of them are guilty.

Maybe I shouldn't complain too much; at ten years old and over 200K, the car has been remarkably trouble-free (1 set of brakes, a clutch, front wheel bearings and a few small things) but I do hate getting hosed...

[Kit]

I'm not a big fan of working on Fords myself. I've owned two, and I'll never own another. My first car was a '77 Pinto with the V-6. Turns out on those particular engines, the timing gear tended to fail at around 65,000 to 70,000 miles. Getting to it means pulling everything forward of the engine block. But my favorite part was having to un-bolt the motor mounts and jack the engine up just to pull the oil pan (which is where all the pieces of the timing gear went after it more or less disintegrated). Shortly after I got rid of it, my girlfriend bought a '78 with the same engine. I warned her not to get it, as it had about 63,000 miles on it. She thought I was just being bitter, and bought it anyway. Sure enough, after a few months, the bloody thing failed and I got to do it all again.

About 11 years ago, I bought an '88 Bronco. They mounted the ignition module on the side of the distributer, less than an inch away from the engine block. As a result, it tended to overheat and fail. About every 6 months, it would go bad, and I'd have to buy a new one to the tune of about $110. They actually had a recall because of that, but by the time I found out about it, my mileage was too high to qualify.

[Geezer]

My Ford is a 78 and it's pretty easy to work on.

But if you ever have to do something like this again, you can use a large medical clamp to close off the heater hoses. With one end closed, it will make a vacuum in the system and keep most of the coolant in the engine.

BTW, you can get these clamps at Harbor Freight...

Geezer

[ccogswel]

Yeah they all are about the same. These newer cars are just really a pain in the butt to work on. Just replaced a starter on my moms 2000 Intrepid. It was a pain. They only gave you just enough cable to reach where it bolts to. So there went the idea of I'll just take it off and twist the starter around to reach the cables to take them loose.

One time a few years ago we had a 95 Rodeo. Had that 3.2 V-6 4x4. Had to replace the starter on it. It was sure a pain, as the oil pan had a lip at the bottom that come down under the starter. So you just couldn't drop the starter. You had to pull this short piece of the exhaust pipe from the manifold down to the Y connector just to get it out. And we all know just how bad exhaust bolts can be to remove when your trying to save them as you have no way to town to replace them.

[natemoen]

My mom used to have a '96 Buick Riviera. To change one is the belts you had to unbolt a engine mount and tweek the engine because the belt ran around the mount. Her car also had a really slow, yet mess oil leak from the oil pan. Well the pan sat about a centimeters above a frame crossmember so you would have to unbolt and lift the engine to pull the pan off to reseal it. Never fixed it.

[CatatonicBug]

Really makes me miss my old '68 VW Bug... Now THAT was an easy car to work on!

[DGXSER]

Had a 67 myself Bug. Very simple, just loosen the bolts and pick the car up off the engine. Then again, it had no cooling system and it took 4 wires, the throttle cable and the heater cables to prep the engine for removal IIRC. Then pull 4 bolts and slide the engine off the tranny. Then lift the car off the engine.....ok...no seriously, lift the car up and roll the engine out from under it.

[CatatonicBug]

Had a 67 myself Bug. Very simple, just loosen the bolts and pick the car up off the engine. Then again, it had no cooling system and it took 4 wires, the throttle cable and the heater cables to prep the engine for removal IIRC. Then pull 4 bolts and slide the engine off the tranny. Then lift the car off the engine.....ok...no seriously, lift the car up and roll the engine out from under it.

Yep! BTDT! 6 bolts hold on a fender, 8 bolts hold on a bumper. The whole car can be lifted by 4 guys (3 if they all ate their wheaties that morning!). The '68 had one caveat though - it had the shortest clutch cable of all the years, so mine stretched out past usable length about once a year, and could not be replaced by a shorter version to allow for stetching. When I decide that I need another cage, I'll be looking for a restored bug. I miss that thing!

[crazy steve]

Volkswagens.... yep, a nice, uncomplicated, cheap to fix car.

But those 'recommended' valve adjustments at every oil change could get old, as well as the Bus driving directions if traveling at speeds above 50 mph; 45 minutes of driving, then 15 minutes stopped for engine cooling (not kidding; that was in the owners manual for my ex's '68 bus). I'm sure that owners not paying attention to that was the reason you almost always saw used buses advertised with 'fresh rebuilt' motors... And they are a bit of a chinese puzzle; you VILL put it together in proper order, nein? Stuff won't fit if you don't....

Got a '71 Super in the driveway converted into a 'roadster' (cut the top off), now known as the 'pervert bug' (going topless! ). One of these days I'll put it back together...

[motoman]

DGXSER, have one of those ourselves.........no issues, plus motor is actually built by Yamaha(3.0 V-six). At 80+thousand on this '03, was going to change plugs.........key word, WAS.....anyway saw that the front ones would be easy enough after removing some plastic covers. Then asked neighbor(dealeship mechanic) how to access rear spark plugs. Said intake plenum had to be removed and nuts holding it torqued @ 7ft.lbs. and if tightened to much will crack the plenum. Plenum is made of carbon fiberand is way costly.......well since Ford doesn't reccomend a plug replacement untill 90K+, they can stay right where thier at......forever for all I care. Just took it on a long trip and it still averages 24mpg@80mph........good enough for me......Also neighbor changed fuel filter for me as I didn't have that special tool to remove fuel filter........what a PITA! Use the reccomended weight oil indicated on the cap too......clearances are tight enough that a heavier oil viscosity can gauld lifters causing a lifter noise permanetly amongst other issues. In other words, put gas in it, change oil reguarly, and drive till the wheels fall off......Oh, and ours is the fast color(red)..........

[crazy steve]

...motor is actually built by Yamaha(3.0 V-six)...

Oh, so it's Yamaha's fault!