2006 Ford Explorer

Ummm, I do not know. I had a 1993 Ford SHO that had warped brake rotors at about 7000 miles; no arguement from Ford, they replaced them.

My 2004 HCH got warped rotors at 10000 miles; Honda dealer said not his problem..Honda North America agreed that it was 'normal wear consumable'...29000 miles later, they warped again!

Last Honda I buy.

My 1978 Honda Civic hatch lock just fell out one day when it was 6 months old...

The battery in my 14 month old 1986 Porsche 944 failed; 1 year life is called normal; the cooling system in it failed and was replaced under warranty within 17 months of new.

The HVAC system in my 3 month old 1986 Acura Integra failed and it was 6 months before it was repaired.

YMMV, but I don't think that Japanese 'quality' is all that much better than USA built stuff. The dealer and company attitude can make it seem better.

 

one mile per gallon increase? What, are they really serious? Why would you even advertise that fact? It's so pathetic as to be laughable. Do a Ford explorer hybrid with HSD and electric 4WD, price it lower than the Highlander by 10 grand and then I'll stop laughing.

The Escape Hybrid I liked. C'mon Ford, keep up the work. Any word on a sedan from them in hybrid form?

 

In the FWIW department, Ford has already introduced an Explorer hybrid. It's called the Mercury Mountaineer hybrid. By the time my old Explorer gives up the ghost (can't fit half a dozen 32 gal garbage cans in my Prius, and wouldn't want to even if I could...) I expect to have a range of reasonably priced hybrid SUV's available to choose from.

Meanwhile, I'll continue to use the SUV when I need a truck and the Prius when I need to go somewhere. As always, YMMV.

Vince

 

Are you sure? Maybe you meant to say "Mariner", which is a different beast entirely.

 

You are absolutely correct...
although actually I meant Mountaineer because that is what registered when I saw "mariner" in the anouncement blurbs (it's been a long time since I've had to shop for an SUV, about once every ten years or so, and last time I looked, the only Mercury SUV was the explorer twin...).

I will not reply off-the-cuff.
I will not reply off-the-cuff.
I will not . . .

 

Probably that is the case, isn't a Mariner just a Ford Escape with a Mercury name badge on it?

 

Everyone has their own anecdotal references with their cars.
Despite what I hear from people, I pay close attention to what Consumer Reports has to say about vehicles.

Consumer Reports recommends every single Toyota model sold.

Consumer Reports recommends all but two Honda models sold.

Consumer Reports recommends only 6 out of 21 Ford models.

Consumer Reports recommends only 4 out of 26 Chevrolet models.

I prefer to go with the numbers...

 

My Ford Explorer lasted 12 years and 196,000 without any major repairs, except for when I hit that curb in the snow last February.

The brake pads that came with the car lasted 50,000 miles before I needed to replace them. Since then, it tended to eat brakes every 25,000 to 30,000 miles, but I think I would blame Meineke for that.

The only significant repair, other than brakes, that I had was at 185,000 miles when a pulley for the serpentine belt seized up. Fortunately, it seems to have been designed to just unscrew itself from the engine block, instead of stripping the threads in the engine block. $150 dollars and an hour later and I was on my way.

And when I had that repair done, I told the mechanic that I was just waiting for it to finally die so I could replace it. He was suprised I said that, because he told me that the car was in great shape and with only 80,000 miles on it, it had a lot of life left in it. I then informed him that the odometer had rolled over, and it really had 185,000 miles on it, and he seemed quite impressed.

I could have driven it longer, but after 12 years, I just wanted a new car.

And then we move on to my other cars. My wife's 7 year old Chevy Malibu has 116,000 miles on it and is still going strong. It had an engine problem at 32,000 miles (valves? lifters? something like that), but the Chevy dealer covered it under warrenty, even though the warrenty expired at 30,000. (My guess at the time was that it was a known problem with a service bulletin on it and they just didn't tell me that). Haven't had a problem with it since.

The car I owned before my Explorer was an '84 Chevy Celebrity station wagon. It lasted 198,000 before I got rid of it. It would have lasted longer, but I had just gotten my first job out of college and I just wanted a new car. It did have a power steering problem around 150,000 miles, but other than that and normal stuff like brakes, I had no problems with it. It wasn't even burning oil much when I got rid of it. I could go 4000 miles and only be down a third of a quart.

Now the Crystler Lebaron that my wife inherited from her grandmother and brought into our marriage was a total piece of crap. I'll give you that.

 

I think that American cars (if you can call these multinational companies American anymore) have gotten their quality levels up to about the same levels as the imports. That was not the case in the 1980's. I had a 1981 Old Cutlass that I bought new in 1980 that pinged on premium unleaded and they said it was normal. It went through 5 ignition control computers, 3 transmissions, 2 starter solenoids, and a few other things before I got rid of it three years later.

I have leased three Mercury Mountaineers, one Olds Bravada, and one Jeep Grand Cherokee over the last 10 years or so - while I never had any of them for more than 3 years, I drove them off the dealer lot and the next time they went back was when I turned them back in at lease end. That says something about the improvement in quality. Now I cannot comment on how they would have fared after 10 years use, but I don't generally keep cars that long.

The last car I kept that long was a 1985 Volvo 740 GLE and in the last three years I had it I think that car cost me about $300 a month in repairs.

 

I think we are heading down the anecdotal that Evan is talking about.

I agree with you flyingprius, I like how Consumer Reports does the reliability comparisons. Interestingly, in the 2005 Car Issue, CR admitted that the reliability gap was decreasing between American and Japanese. I don't the issue in front of me or I would quote it verbatim.

 

My 1996 CivicHX's rotors still will warp also although around every 100K miles. Read around, it happens to all Civics because of their small rotors. Why? It's most likely because we brake hard and fast to a stop, and then sit with all that heat at one point for the duration of the light (minutes?).

Being the rotors are small, they can't dump heat that fast, and then getting contact smelted at the light, what do you expect? And it can still happen to any vehicle braking hard and fast too.

Although I thought HCH also had mag brakes so the front rotors shouldn't get used much...

I worry about the Prius also, but at least they're not getting used until < 8mph, and I don't need to press so hard on the brakes anymore since the mag brakes work earlier, harder, and more consistently than friction brakes.

 

I never rode or hit the brakes hard, especially in the 3-4 months that the car was new. I learned to use the engine braking and downshift (my HCH was a 5spd manual) and tried to roll to the light, etc. In other words, I am not hard on brakes. I and my independent mechanic came to the conclusion that Honda puts rotors that are too light in order to save on unsprung weight. FWIW, in 2 years of club racing a 944, I never warped a rotor or even had to replace pads. I replaced the HCH rotors with heavier after market rotors that lasted 29000 miles befor they needed to be turned.

Now, I trust that the Prius, with larger wheels has a better built set of rotors. Time will tell....;-)