Thought I would post a rare good news story about my 2013 MK3 Focus 1.0 EcoBoost, which has just had its wet belts changed at 202,000km.

I bought the car in 2016 when it already had 149,000km on the clock. Service history was all from Ford and the car seemed to have led an easy life despite the high mileage. Presumably it was mainly used on the motorway. Since then, it has averaged only 8000km per year, probably 15-20% short trips, the rest longer runs. I'm ashamed to admit that although I roughly kept to the service schedule in terms of mileage, the low mileage meant that it went up to three years without an oil change 😬. It has only been serviced two times since I bought it, once by an independent in 2018 and once by me in June 2021. Both times the correct Ford-specification oil was used. All I can say in my defence was that I had a young child and only discovered the time-bomb nature of the EcoBoost engine last year (at which point I immediately serviced it and upgraded the degas hose to MK3.5 spec). 

Anyhoo, since finding out about the risk of wet belt fibres blocking the oil pump I've been worrying about the condition of the belts (and the engine) and whether it was worth changing them or just getting rid of the car. In the end I decided that I would get it done despite the eye-watering cost here in Sweden (£1,700), because I like the car, I believe in maintaining things to extend their life, and I knew that to replace it would ultimately either cost lots more money (to buy something significantly newer) or mean buying a similar age car but of unknown history. 

When I booked that car in I asked them to call me when the sump was off so I could inspect the oil pump and the belts, and I was delighted to see that the oil pump pick-up gauze was clean and the belts appeared to be in great condition. The mechanic said everything looked really good. I can now be reasonably confident it was worth doing the job and I hope to get a good few more years life out of the car. 

So, it appears a slightly dodgy (but not too terrible) service history on a 1.0 EcoBoost, operating in harsh-ish (cold winters) conditions, need not be a certain-death sentence for the wet belts. 

Having also just replaced the AC compressor (and the discs and pads last summer), I look forward to the gearbox falling out or a tree falling on it sometime in the near future. 

 

That's certainly very encouraging. Our Ecoboost has only done just over 41K miles but is due for a wetbelt change as it's 10 years old this year. In our 6 years ownership it's been serviced annually at a Ford dealership even though the annual mileage has never exeeded 6,500. The only exceptions were 2 years ago following the lockdown when the mileage was so low that I skipped a service and just changed the oil myself using a Pela pump to suck the old oil out and last year when I put it into the local indie that I've used for years for the Mk2.5. Unfortunately the idiots used Forte engine flush. I naively assumed the 1L Ecoboost had been around long enough for independants to know about these things. When I queried it they claimed they'd checked with Forte who stated their product was compatible but I don't believe that. Hopefully the belt change will get done before any problems arise, if I don't swap it in before then. Although our average annual mileage is low it's nearly all extra-urban on dual-carriageways or fast A-roads and journeys last 30-60 minutes with just 5 minutes or so of local roads at each end for warm-up and cool-down so I'm pretty confident the internals are clean. Certainly the oil I sucked out looked new.

This Forte product does claim to be compatible with wet belts, so hopefully that’s what they used.

https://www.forteuk.co.uk/product/new-generation-engine-flush/

Thanks for the story. I'm in the middle of deciding whether to get the belt done. 2013 1.0 125 with 39K miles.

Mine's booked in for wet belt replacement in May, 9 years old and 64.5K miles on the clock. No engine issues whatsoever so far and an 80% service history but will be interested to see what the condition is of the items removed. Will post an update on here for information purposes.

41 minutes ago, Acid House 1988 said:

9 years old and 64.5K miles on the clock.

Very sensible to be getting it done early.

So many seem to think they have to wait until 10 years or 100,000 miles, and seem to miss the point that these are a maximum, not an actual target.

I wish you luck and hope all goes well with the planned work. 👍

Thanks Uno, as I said earlier, will report back once the job is done so that others on here can get some indication of what the situation might be with their own vehicles.

23 hours ago, unofix said:

 

So many seem to think they have to wait until 10 years or 100,000 miles, and seem to miss the point that these are a maximum, not an actual target.

I wish you luck and hope all goes well with the planned work. 👍

Me 🤣

Mine is now 10 years old exactly ('13). 

Will get the job done April or May.

I thought the main idea with wet belts was to catch out lazy owners that don't change the oil regularly and don't use the correct spec

and here's how...

not widely spoken about, but the old world additives that made engine oil incredibly durable and long lasting (High SAPS) , have been swapped to Low SAPS, (for environmental concerns - lies)  But to get Low SAPS oils we have to discard all the old proven principles, use less durable materials in many moving engine parts and the newer additives are far more expensive - they also provide significantly lower lubrication properties under extreme abuse, but the main win is its magically less durable and fails to time - helping the engine and wet belts self destruct

 

I know of a 19 plate fiesta 30k miles, belt has deteriorated and blocked up the strainer. So low mileage and not to old don't escape the issue. 

7 hours ago, iantt said:

I know of a 19 plate fiesta 30k miles, belt has deteriorated and blocked up the strainer. So low mileage and not to old don't escape the issue. 

Any idea on the service history or the oil used? For a newish vehicle on such low mileage that seems strange at the very least....

Well, my focus Titanium 125 is  Feb 2017, so 7 years old.

I have had it on the market for some time with no success and people are asking  If it has had a new engine or at least cambelt change so the buying public seem to be  aware of the problems thanks largely to the internet.

I have always  used a Ford trained Independent for regular services and he always  insisted  on the correct oil being used. It’s been serviced on the dot annually. I have just had a new catalytic converter 

fitted at €1450. 

I did use it for towing a trailer tent all over France and Italy for a year and it is an amazing car with plenty of power. 
 

Im thinking of having it done now which should give me another 6/7 years peace of mind.

 

On 3/24/2023 at 4:34 PM, Acid House 1988 said:

Thanks Uno, as I said earlier, will report back once the job is done so that others on here can get some indication of what the situation might be with their own vehicles.

Any news on this? 🙂