My son’s Ford Escape transmission just quit one day earlier this year. Got a new transmission under warranty, but it took close to a month and the bastards wouldn’t cover the rental car for the whole time.
My daughter’s Escape had horrible transmission problems and the dealer accused her of towing a heavy load in the Rocky Mountains. She’s never towed anything and I don’t even think her car has a hitch. The transmission body and shuttle valves were all varnished up. They were going to charge her $1,400 for the repair until I got uninvolved and they cut the price in half.
Daughter #2 had an Escape in Hawaii. Horrible transmission problems. It would just stop transmitting power to the wheels when pulling out from a stop — a deadly accident waiting to happen. MANY other problems — a constant headache and money sink. She just bought a Suburu.
The sunroof on my Expedition failed. Yes, the sunroof. I took it to the dealer before the warranty expired, but the were all booked up. I scheduled an appointment about three weeks out. The factory warranty expired during that three weeks and Ford would not cover the $3,000 repair under warranty. I couldn’t get the extended warranty company to cover it until I contacted the dealer where I bought it. They got the extended warranty company to agree to pay it.
Long-time Ford family, but no more. Unbelievably crappy products and terrible customer service.
We had a 95 Mustang with Ford’s notorious 3.8L V6. It went through half a dozen head gaskets while it was still under warranty. Every time the dealer would try to deny that there was a problem even after we pulled into their lot on a warm afternoon with steam coming out of the exhaust pipe and engine oil in the cooling system. We were basically a Ford family also... not so much these days.
“Unbelievably crappy products and terrible customer service.”
And here is an explanation of the root cause.
The video is about Tesla manufacturing and @ 41-minute mark Sandy Munro talks about his time at Ford and Dr Deming.
Munro is a most interesting character.
The Video is long and mostly inside Tesla stuff, still some fun.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=pih4kU6yvz8
From wiki on Dr Deming, a huge influence on Japenese QC.
A number of Japanese manufacturers applied his techniques widely and experienced heretofore unheard-of levels of quality and productivity. The improved quality combined with the lowered cost created new international demand for Japanese products.