9 minutes ago, TomsFocus said:

Low mileage is not good for cars!

It's an interesting one, this. That's certainly my usual take on things - one of the most troublesome cars I had was a very low mileage example bought from a colleague.

The 1.5 version of the "Dragon" doesn't seem to be throwing up the same number of problems. Over on Fiesta ST forums there are lots of cars which do very low mileage but (I guess) are driven quite hard, yet the only failure I've seen was one of the early variety with the gear driven pump. 

Perhaps one factor as several of us have already mentioned is Ford's usual 2 year/18k service routine? The ST is on an annual service schedule.

Yet it's hardly the owners fault for following the service schedule prescribed by the manufacturer. Perhaps Ford should have been much clearer about the need for more frequent oil changes on low mileage cars, rather than the roundabout mention I referred to in an earlier post.

 

6 minutes ago, Eric Bloodaxe said:

Yet it's hardly the owners fault for following the service schedule prescribed by the manufacturer. Perhaps Ford should have been much clearer about the need for more frequent oil changes on low mileage cars, rather than the roundabout mention I referred to in an earlier post.

Yes, I do agree with that.  And I should probably add that I don't feel the belts 'should' be breaking at 6 years old, just that I also don't feel it's unreasonable or even unfit for purpose, so wouldn't expect to get anything from Ford.  

Equally, I wouldn't expect to get anything from VW if my own oil pump belt broke at 5 years old/40k miles (but long periods off road).  As I'll now have to change the fuel filter due to leakage, and the pollen filter is pretty ripe, I am considering changing the oil as well.  It has only covered around 15 miles since being changed 3 years ago, but has also spent several hours idling, and the rest of the time outside absorbing moisture from the air.  I am wondering whether there's a cheap test strip I can buy to check the moisture content and quality of oil to save wasting it if it may still be ok.

16 minutes ago, TomsFocus said:

I am wondering whether there's a cheap test strip I can buy to check the moisture content

You got me wondering about that. Just did a quick Google for "oil test strips" a few minutes ago and got loads of hits straight away. Then I saw they were for cooking oil!.😀 

Did find things like this, though:

https://www.amazon.com/Transmittance-Gasoline-Automobile-Lubricating-Temperature/dp/B0CHLT3ZGG

1 hour ago, TomsFocus said:

If it's just belts stripping teeth without any mechanical failures then I don't feel that 6 years is unreasonable for that, with low mileage and (most likely) degraded oil between the two-yearly servicing.

I'd kind of agree that if it is just the teeth stripping off the belt then it could be expected at, or after 6 years of low mileage use.

The problem I see is that designing an engine in such a way that low mileage use can cause such a problem is surely at best a design oversight or even a design failure.

To compound the problem Ford, not the customer, set the recommended service intervals, which they (not the customer) calculated and set both mileage and age parameters as to how and when the vehicle would require service, ie. oil and filter changes. Ford have quietly acknowledged that their recommended intervals have been wrong by the fact that on some vehicles, like the Transit they are now saying the wet belt should be changed at 6 years of age.

My overall take on the situation is that Ford has designed a family of engines which were doomed to fail from the moment they went in to production. Steps could have been taken quite quickly to reduce the amount of catastrophic failures by: (1) changing the intervals between service. (2) changing the recommended wet belt replacement from 10 years to 8 years. These changes would not have prevented all of the failures which occur at an alarming rate, but would have perhaps reduced the amount by a very significant amount.

   

We will have to disagree on the low mileage design aspect.  New cars take such a large amount of energy and recourses to produce that they should be expected to cover a decent number of miles each year to make production worthwhile in my opinion.  They should be designed for that rather than low mileage.  Currently, I do believe that wetbelts and 2-yearly oil changes will work ok at average mileage on commuter cars, but we'll have to wait a few more years to see whether the failure rate increases around 10 years old (as it does with the dry-belt diesels which frequently fail in the 10th year now).

I do agree that low mileage customers should have been advised to change oil more frequently.  Perhaps using a dual servicing option, longlife for average/high mileage, and timed to 12 months for low mileage.  (Like another manufacturer did... )

The oilpump wetbelts that are failing on chain engines haven't reached 8 years old yet, so none of those would have been saved by an 8-year interval.  They might have been saved by a 6-year interval, but even at average mileage, a £2k bill every 6 years makes a Ford unviable compared to other manufacturers equivalent models, so Ford are in a difficult position now.  I wouldn't be surprised if they reduced the interval after they've finished selling ICE and only sell EV...

Having said all of that, they really messed up by not replacing both wetbelts with chains when they revised the 1.0 EcoBoost.  I still don't understand why they'd go through all the R&D & tooling cost of revising an engine with a known fault, but only improving half of that fault!  I must be missing something though, now knowing VW also use oilpump wetbelts.  I'm not sure it is a cost thing, as there are still plenty of quality features on the later VW engine.  I can only guess that there is more of an emissions saving from using a wetbelt than a chain or gear driven pump.  But would be very interested to learn the exact reason.  

2 hours ago, TomsFocus said:

2 hours ago, TomsFocus said:

I still don't understand why they'd go through all the R&D & tooling cost of revising an engine with a known fault, but only improving half of that fault!  I must be missing something !!

 

Likewise.

Only yesterday I was reminiscing about skinned knuckles while looking at the BMC A-series engined cars at the Classic show I mentioned elsewhere, and thinking what a rubbish design the bypass hose was. But it pales into insignificance compared to that!

Update on my car & engine the Ford dealer rang today, it was the manager of the service department, wanted to know what was happening with my car and what am I doing with it.

Basically told him I'm going through the ombudsman and waiting for a case agent to be assigned, he wasn't impressed said in his experience it could take upto a year before they start to look at my case, and we don't want my car in their yard anymore and would ship it out to my home address or get it fixed at my expense, so pretty fed up now the dealers know how the ombudsman works and it's a time thing.

I've got until the end of September to decide, rang the ombudsman on hold for 20 minutes which is difficult when your at work to stay on hold for any length of time.

It would appear Ford are going to break me first because they have my car and it's been 2 months and I'm struggling without it and second if I pull it out of the dealers yard and fix it at a sensible price they don't have to pay up for it even if the ombudsman wins my claim.

Sad times

A Ford dealership is just an independent business that has an agreement with the national representative of the manufacturer to use the brand name and sell/service the manufacturers products.

Being an independent business, it is fully understandable that the dealership wants the car gone from their premises. Right now, the car just takes up their space without generating any profit. Some companies even charge the customer for storage while the vehicle is left at their premises for an extended period.


These days, the economic life expectancy of a car is around 10 Years. This basically means that a 6 Year old car only has about 40% of its economic life expectancy left. From that point of view a 45% contribution as a gesture of goodwill is actually not bad. Especially since Ford is usually less generous in similar cases.

Yes 45% would be great towards a fix to my car, sadly Ford or the independent dealer want to charge £11000 to fix it, which means I have to find £6000, sounds fair doesn't it cars only worth £10500 on we buy any car.

Did they even bother to inspect the engine before quoting a new service engine?


If the engine is switched off immediately (within 30 seconds) once the oil pressure light/message are displayed the engine is usually still OK. In many cases installing a new oil pump wetbelt, tensioner and cleaning out the oil pump inlet and sump is sufficient.

33 minutes ago, JW1982 said:

Did they even bother to inspect the engine before quoting a new service engine?


If the engine is switched off immediately (within 30 seconds) once the oil pressure light/message are displayed the engine is usually still OK. In many cases installing a new oil pump wetbelt, tensioner and cleaning out the oil pump inlet and sump is sufficient.

Well they said they did, that was £450, engine was turned off as soon as light came on, they didn't remove any bearing caps to inspect but offered to replace oil pump and belt for £1500 but wouldn't offer any guarantees on it working and said it was at my own risk, I think £450 to remove the sump is a bit steep, I've heard that if low pressure and management light comes on it records the oil pressure, this wasn't passed onto me if that's true, engine management light did not come on BTW.

25 minutes ago, Wood Gnome said:

I think £450 to remove the sump is a bit steep,

You would think so, but having seen the work involved to remove the sump on the Ecoboost 1.0, I can understand the cost. An independent garage would probably quote you £300

25 minutes ago, Wood Gnome said:

engine was turned off as soon as light came on,

If that is the case you're in with a good chance that a new oil pump, wet belt and clean up will save the day. Personally looking at your options (which are not good), I'd have the car collected and transported to an independent garage to get that work done. If you get it up and running for under £1500 I'd consider it a success.  

What I would do in this situation:

- Collect the car and bring it to a reputable independent.
- Rotate the engine by hand (remove the spark plugs if not already removed).
- Have one of the main crankshaft bearing caps removed and the bearing shells inspected.
- Have one of the big end bearing caps removed and the bearing shells inspected.

Since Ford does not specify any technical information for the bottom end internals (Ford considers the bottom end to be unserviceable) it is important to check and register the amount of torque that is required to undo the bearing cap bolts. After inspection the bearing cap bolts can be tightened to the previously registered torque value.

If the engine rotates freely and no damage or wear to the white metal of the bearing shells can be found:

- Have the oil pump cleaned or replaced.
- Have the sump cleaned.
- Have the oil pump belt and belt tensioner replaced. Note that the balance shaft needs to be correctly timed.
- Optional but recommended: Have the timing chain and chain guides replaced (these need to be removed anyway to obtain access to the oil pump belt).

Document everything you are doing, written and photographic.

Fetch the car out of the dealer and source and fit a known running used AUTOMATIC engine of EXACTLY the same part number.

Have the engine fitted by an independent, it will be much cheaper than the dealer (who won't fit a used engine anyway) and have the oil pump belt changed before fitting.

All of your ancillaries will be OK to reuse EXCEPT the turbo, the oil starvation would've killed that too.

Then, after taking advice, take Ford to the small claims court to try and recover the costs 

Change the oil at least every 12 months or 12,000 miles (max), do not use engine flushes or oil additives, use good quality fuel and disable the Stop/Start system

10 hours ago, unofix said:

You would think so, but having seen the work involved to remove the sump on the Ecoboost 1.0, I can understand the cost. An independent garage would probably quote you £300

It should be slightly quicker & easier on the chain engine as the cat/downpipe doesn't run under the sump on those.  Not sure I've seen anyone quote a time for that so far.