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Hi all - Here's a tracking request for 1FAHP3K27CL167110 Many thanks!

Here is a U of M study about "End of Life Vehicle" or Producer Responsibility that will affect us here in the US sooner or later: http://css.snre.umich.edu/css_doc/CSS01-01.pdf Pretty soon you'll be able to return it when you're done driving it. Too bad - some of the locals will have to find alternate forms of flower pots - maybe old boats will find a use. Also in the spirit of sustainability is Ford's use of recycled materials. Some new Ford Focus's will feature the equivalent of two pairs of used jeans in the interior and for insulation. Let me see ....based on my daughters clothing bills this amounts to what, a $500 option? "Recycled clothing isn’t just for the thrift store anymore. Starting early next year, the Ford Motor Company will release the next-generation Focus featuring used denim in the seats, carpet backing, and as sound-absorption materials for interior quietness. The amount of post-consumer cotton from blue jeans used in each vehicle comes out to roughly two pairs of average-sized American jeans, based on pounds of cotton used per yard of denim and the yards of denim used to make a pair of jeans." http://www.care2.com/greenliving/2012-ford-focus-will-have-recycled-denim-seats.html Finally, you may have heard that Henry Ford made running boards out of the packing crates of incoming material. That is disputed in the post here (http://www.mtfca.com/discus/messages/50893/79903.html?1233059301), but it makes a good recycling story. Anybody have proof one way or the other?

I'm sure Ford's marketing department is all over this, if they've hired anyone out of college in the last 5 years. But for us older folk, there are some nifty (pardon the old fart word) ways of collecting what's being said on the web about any topic you want to know what people are talking about....even when they are not talking to you in a Forum like this. The tool is NetVibes. Easy peezy to set up. You just get a free account and make a list of key words that you want to get a daily feed on, based on the search engine discoveries of the day. Possible sources include news, blogs, ..... You can make your collections private for just you to see or they can be public for all to see. So ..... the admins of these forums could easily set up daily feeds to see what the entire world is saying about "Ford" or "Mustang" or "Pinto Restoration" or whatever the current hot topics are. Smart organizations pay attention to what's being said in case they need to intervene before something seriously defamatory gets out of control (anyone see the gross Dominoes pizza fiasco?). So I imagine this is a pretty good assignment for co-ops and interns, since they're on the web 24/7 anyway. Link is here: http://www.netvibes.com/en

Ok - I am about to be the proud owner of 2 blue ovals, so don't kick me off.....but have you seen the VW Amarok? http://www.netcarshow.com/volkswagen/2011-amarok/ 2l diesel is one engine option....pricey and tiny box....but pretty close to what this Ranger owner wants. but alas..... http://www.autoblog.com/2010/08/27/we-repeat-volkswagen-amarok-not-coming-to-u-s/ It's not coming here. Not yet at least....a lot can change when gasoline passes $5 per gallon....

Ok let's see who knows the scoop on this one..... Back in 2009..... ENERGY-EFFICIENT ENGINE TECHNOLOGY WINS FORD TEAM NATIONAL INVENTOR OF THE YEAR AWARD The Intellectual Property Owners Education Foundation is honoring the inventors of the Ford-patented Plasma Transferred Wire Arc (PTWA) technology used to apply coatings on engine cylinder bores with the 2009 National Inventor of the Year Award Ford’s PTWA thermal spray coating process for aluminum engine blocks replaces heavy cast iron liners which improves an engine’s fuel efficiency by reducing engine weight and internal piston friction losses Ford has 95 issued and pending patents related to the new PTWA coating technology and will introduce it on its North American powertrain lineup within the next year Here's the source: http://media.ford.com/article_print.cfm?article_id=30443 So.......is Ford applying PTA bore spray in production now? If so, on which engines?

I discovered that the air bag system warning light comes on if the little light bulb in the Passenger Airbag Turn Off switch box burns out. Not keen on the expense or hassle of replacing the entire switch box (since the bulb is integral), I discovered than one can simply solder in a replacement bulb from Radio Shack (sorry Dealer Parts guys). There's nothing like the satisfaction of fixing something yourself (until your airbag fails to deploy of course)!

Here's a little success story and a tip I easily added a PIE aux input adapter for my Ranger. It plugs into the back of the head unit that has a CD changer port (my truck doesn't actually have the changer - I think there is a different model in case you do). Anyway - all was almost good - except after about 30 seconds of playing an MP3 player through it the volume would almost disappear. The aux input cable connected to the adapter box via RCA connectors.....supposed to work right, right? The problem was poor ground at the connectors. The helpful folks at PIE advised me to solder the RCA outer shield (ground) connectors together. Presto - works great. So spoiled can't listen to commercial radio stations any more. Just one more "Ground matters" lesson....

Imagine having a flat tire in a downpour and late for a meeting...know that you're a handy guy and change this puppy in 15 minutes... only to discover the silly lock that protects the tire nobody would steal is frozen! You can see the spare tire, but you can't have it! Is the solution really only to drill out the lock?

Question for ya'll.... I drove my 2000 Ranger for tens of thousands of miles with the front sway bar tie rods broken. I thought it rode and handled fine - the worst part was my wife saying it sounded like it was falling apart whenever she borrowed it to pick up mulch. But before replacing the tires I thought I'd get replace the rods and get the front end aligned. Anyway, that's when I noticed the SEVERE tire wear on the inside edge of both front tires. I'll admit that since I knew I was riding on borrowed time on the tires, I was driving in a rather spirited fashion arround corners. So the question is: Is it obvious to the experts out there that broken tie rods mess up geometry control such that accelerated tire wear happens?

------ I just did, but guess I have 15" rims. Believe it or not, I had 105k miles on my 5-speed 3.0l Ranger on the original tires! Got Goodyear replacements at Walmart - good enough at this stage I suppose.

Ok - I must be an outlier, but I'm looking for a small to midsize 4 door pickup. Australia has great little things they call "Utes", Aussie for "Utility" I suppose. Anyway - I've heard the counter arguments - they're not much cheaper and don't get much better fuel economy - .... so how about we work on improving that? I just need to haul bicycles, the odd DIY project materials, mulch now and then etc. I just don't need or want a monster truck...nor the mini-mouse things that we saw decades ago where a box was welded onto the back of a rabbit. Ford makes an awesome riding truck. My Ranger rides better than a mini-van and worlds better than the bucking bronco Tacoma. They only serious offering that I know of is the Nissan Frontier....but Ford could make a better truck. Is anything coming?