Dave_C

First, let me say that I'm a loyal Ford buyer. I currently own a GT500 Mustang and an F350 dually. I've had many Ford cars and trucks over the years. I have read the Blueovalforums on a regular basis for quite a while, but haven't needed to post until now. I would to see if anyone had any suggestions for a problem I'm having. I think most would agree that a rearend should last many 10's if not 100's -of thousands of miles if there has been no abuse. My wife has an '05 Ford Explorer 2WD V-6. It will be 3 years old in June and has 45K miles so it's out of the 3/36 warranty. At less than 12K miles the rear end developed a loud roaring/howl. The dealer replaced just about everything in the center section. Gears, bearings, etc. They may have also replaced the center itself as they told my wife when she picked it up that one of the caps had cracked/broken. The problem was fixed, but now the roaring sound (sounds like gears, but could be bearings) is back over the last 2K miles and getting louder. A quick search on google shows up with at least 4 TSB's on axle whine or howl, so it's a known problem. I don't mind paying for a freak problem, but if this common and has already been fixed once I was wondering how to get Ford to help me out with the cost of repair. A rear end should last longer than this. A friend of mine is a Ford dealer tech in another state. He suggested that I might be able to get them to do something called a "PO5" where Ford would pay for half and I would pay for half. Thanks, Dave_C