Some Ford Vehicles To Have 'Best In Class' Quality By 2025

[rmc523]

On 6/27/2023 at 1:37 PM, iamweasel said:

 

And how do you know that?  You can't go by what these rags report.....actual internal quality data has never correlated with JD Power/Consumer Reports.  

 

I spent 3 years of my Ford life micro-analyzing our actual warranty claim / aftermarket parts & service data and comparing them to these freaking surveys so I have a pretty good idea how all this works.   This was always a hot topic because the press/Wall Street is always asking questions about these surveys to Ford's management.   At least with JD Power, they would give you more info and help us investigate and even talk to customers to understand why certain survey questions were answered a certain way.  Consumer Reports would not help / share info at all. 

 

Ultimately, the survey questions are written in a way to generate responses more than they are designed to be fair/accurate questions.  Just because some old dude can't figure out how to pair his bluetooth doesn't mean the radio is broken, you know?   Too many of the questions are about things customers don't like or aren't used to, more so than what's actually broken.  

 

I agree.

 

I've long wished there'd be a "actual problem" section vs. a "dislike" section - there's a massive difference between "the engine fell out of my car and I had to peddle Flintstone style" and "the radio knob doesn't turn as smoothly as I'd like", yet they both score equally in a lot of these metrics.

 

19 minutes ago, akirby said:

Silvererra and Canyorado count as one competitor each.

I thought they cancelled Frontier but apparently not.  I am seeing a lot of Titans.

 

As for Ridgeline, it does everything that at least half the F150 owners do with theirs.

 

No, they just redesigned Frontier for the first time since like '05.  Titan got a redesign recently too, but there's been talk they may drop it altogether.

[akirby]

1 hour ago, rmc523 said:

 

No, they just redesigned Frontier for the first time since like '05.  Titan got a redesign recently too, but there's been talk they may drop it altogether.

The Titans I’ve seen have all been the PRO versions with more aggressive body cladding and they don’t look bad.

[Chrisgb]

2 hours ago, akirby said:

Silvererra and Canyorado count as one competitor each.

I thought they cancelled Frontier but apparently not.  I am seeing a lot of Titans.

 

As for Ridgeline, it does everything that at least half the F150 owners do with theirs.

I somewhat agree about the GM trucks, but they are sold under separate channels, which is good for F-Series marketing. There have been few calendar or model years that Ford made more light trucks than GM. I thought at the time of the 2009 bailout, that GM should drop the Chevrolet name from the Silverado and market all trucks as GMCs, along with going back to the C/K nomenclature and use the Silverado & Sierra names as models again (shoulda kept Saturn and dropped Buick in NA, too). The current styling differences could have been for separate trims.

The 2024 Ranger will debut as a SuperCrew w/5ft bed only, just like the 2024 ok; "Canyorados." Maybe rolling out only one configuration for now is tied to the overall push for better quality on Ford's part. I Hope so. Unknown if either Ford or GM will bring back/offer SuperCabs or CrewCabs w/5- or 6ft box, as Tacoma and Frontier offer them for 2024. 

[Captainp4]

On 6/28/2023 at 12:38 AM, T-dubz said:

This shouldn’t be that hard for ford, especially when the classes for each of these vehicles is so small.
 

F150 has 3 competitors?

Superduty has 2?

Ranger has 3?

Bronco has 1?

Does transit have a competitor in the US? 

 

They should have added Maverick too, with only one competitor, they have a 50% chance to be best in class ?.

 

With all the issues the explorer has had, it should be one of the priorities, especially since it’s still one of ford’s best selling products.

I know you were making a joke here, but is the ridgeline considered same class as maverick or is it ranger size? Hyundai truck being the other I assume?
 

[HotRunrGuy]

37 minutes ago, Captainp4 said:

I know you were making a joke here, but is the ridgeline considered same class as maverick or is it ranger size? Hyundai truck being the other I assume?
 

 

Size-wise, the Ridgline is like the Ranger, but is actually about 5" or so wider.  The chart below is from left to right;

Maverick, Ranger , Ridgeline

 

HRG

[rperez817]

On 6/26/2023 at 10:50 AM, rperez817 said:

 Ford Motor Company has a long way to go until it achieves best in class quality.

 

Yesterday, NHTSA expanded its investigation of catastrophic engine failures involving 2.7L and 3.0L engines in Bronco, Edge, Explorer, F-150, Aviator, and Nautilus. This affects nearly 709,000 vehicles. INOA-EA23002-10790.pdf (nhtsa.gov)

[silvrsvt]

16 minutes ago, rperez817 said:

 

Yesterday, NHTSA expanded its investigation of catastrophic engine failures involving 2.7L and 3.0L engines in Bronco, Edge, Explorer, F-150, Aviator, and Nautilus. This affects nearly 709,000 vehicles. INOA-EA23002-10790.pdf (nhtsa.gov)

 

And this has been already fixed and identified...it was limited to a production batch of bad valves. 

[akirby]

32 minutes ago, silvrsvt said:

 

And this has been already fixed and identified...it was limited to a production batch of bad valves. 

But not a recall.  I don’t think it needs a recall - the bad ones already failed and were fixed u dear warranty.  I think the NHTSA just wants to make sure it’s the same problem and won’t continue happening.

[HotRunrGuy]

1 hour ago, silvrsvt said:

 

And this has been already fixed and identified...it was limited to a production batch of bad valves. 

 

809 engine replacements sounds like it was more than just Bronco failures, which is all we really heard about last year.

 

HRG

[DeluxeStang]

On 10/3/2023 at 6:53 AM, silvrsvt said:

 

And this has been already fixed and identified...it was limited to a production batch of bad valves. 

Wasn't it only like 50 engines impacted as well? Out of the 300,000 broncos that have been produced thus far, give or take. I firmly believe we're living in a golden age for car reliability and longevity. But the internet blows things out of proportion, and misleads people into believing it's more of an issue than it is. Kind of like mean world hypothesis, but for car reliablity. The 2.5 hybrid in our maverick is a pretty solid powertrain, but I've heard several people say the maverick isn't built to last because some people on the internet have had issues. 

[akirby]

17 minutes ago, DeluxeStang said:

Wasn't it only like 50 engines impacted as well? Out of the 300,000 broncos that have been produced thus far, give or take. I firmly believe we're living in a golden age for car reliability and longevity. But the internet blows things out of proportion, and misleads people into believing it's more of an issue than it is. Kind of like mean world hypothesis, but for car reliablity. The 2.5 hybrid in our maverick is a pretty solid powertrain, but I've heard several people say the maverick isn't built to last because some people on the internet have had issues. 

According to the article it has affected 800+ vehicles so far.

[HotRunrGuy]

18 minutes ago, DeluxeStang said:

Wasn't it only like 50 engines impacted as well? 

 

Did you read the NHTSA.Gov pdf linked above?   809 engines have been replaced (so far).

 

HRG

[silvrsvt]

The 50 number comes from self reported issues on Bronco6G. 

 

If its 800 plus engines out of 700000 vehicles, that is not even a 1% failure rate

 

[ice-capades]

Ford's vehicle quality aspirations go back decades with little improvement. The Company talks about quality and spends billions of dollars in related warranty claims without any substantial quality improvements. Many of us remember Ford's long term advertising slogan... "Quality is Job #1"  

[akirby]

10 minutes ago, ice-capades said:

Ford's vehicle quality aspirations go back decades with little improvement. The Company talks about quality and spends billions of dollars in related warranty claims without any substantial quality improvements. Many of us remember Ford's long term advertising slogan... "Quality is Job #1"  

Until they are willing to stop or slow product rollouts (which they have been doing to some extent) and stop nickel and diming the suppliers it won’t improve a lot.  Just keeping existing platforms and drivetrains will help a lot as problems like this are identified and fixed.

[GearheadGrrrl]

A lot of Ford's quality failures are little faults that never get fixed like my 2022 Transit Connect's 2nd row seat fold down releases. Had one fail right after I bought it, Ford sent wrong part then two whole seat frames that didn't work out of the box. Other owners tell me this has been a problem throughout the outgoing Transit Connect's decade long model run, yet Ford still hasn't come up with a fix- Heck, they don't even have repair instructions in the service manual! 

 

Besides chasing away repeat customers, this is costing Ford serious $$$- Individual parts aren't available and shipping a whole seat frame from Spain to a dealer ain't cheap. At this point this unfixed failure has probably eaten up any profit Ford made on the vehicle and it's now eligible for a Lemon Law buyback... If this the way Ford cultivates customer relations?

[grbeck]

On 10/4/2023 at 2:09 PM, akirby said:

Until they are willing to stop or slow product rollouts (which they have been doing to some extent) and stop nickel and diming the suppliers it won’t improve a lot.  Just keeping existing platforms and drivetrains will help a lot as problems like this are identified and fixed.

 

The transmission in our 2014 Escape completely died last year. It happened at 130,000 miles, but my wife was still furious - she believes that there should not be an engine or transmission failure before 200,000 miles. (Meanwhile, a friend had the transmission in his wife's 2014 Escape completely fail at 75,000 miles, so perhaps we should count ourselves lucky.) At this point, I can't even talk to her about getting another Ford.

 

Her attitude regarding this is one I've heard from many people. They view 200,000 miles as the new benchmark.

 

Our 2004 Focus SE sedan was a beast - traded with 239,000 miles on the odometer, it had no transmission or engine problems, and the air conditioning still blew ice-cold air. 

 

Even in Pennsylvania, where road salt is used regularly and people have to deal with winter, it is not uncommon to see plenty of square-body Escapes, first-generation Fusions, mid-2000 Explorers and 2003-11 Focuses still on the road. Ford can build quality vehicles when it wants to. 

Edited October 10, 2023 by grbeck

[DeluxeStang]

On 10/4/2023 at 12:02 PM, ice-capades said:

Ford's vehicle quality aspirations go back decades with little improvement. The Company talks about quality and spends billions of dollars in related warranty claims without any substantial quality improvements. Many of us remember Ford's long term advertising slogan... "Quality is Job #1"  

It seems like Ford's were generally high quality vehicles during the Mulally era. The focus/fiesta with its DCT was really the only major loser during the 2010s. 

 

But I agree, the eras that bookend that have been more problematic. It seems like Ford always has these eras of unreliable vehicles, then they pivot and make some very reliable products, then they put out disasters. 

 

It does seem like what Farley is trying is gradually improving quality, the 2023 super duty launch hasn't had a ton of quality issues, the maverick and BS launches seemed to go well, s650 seems to be doing well. So here's hoping Ford is starting to pull out of this quality funk that started with the 2020 explorer imo. 

Edited October 11, 2023 by DeluxeStang