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JDPower Vehicle Dependability Study


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But yet, oddly enough Lincoln came in 10th overall, which the only major difference between it and Ford is the Powershift transmissions and Heavy Duty trucks.

 

Most complaints are with infotainment systems and not engines/transmissions, but they get rated on the same scale. I wonder if Sync 3 will help improve this or not.

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This was for 2013 model year vehicles, which is when MFT was at its worst. Still, to be at the bottom next to Dodge is unacceptable. They have to do better.

 

That was also the launch of the 2013 Fusion and MKZ which had many many issues plus some persistent 2012 Escape launch issues.

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This indicates that Ford scored very poorly in all aspects for quality rankings, not just features which was the assumption. Lincoln's scores were adversely effected by features only which we can assume to be MyLincoln Touch or other amenities shared with Ford. So Ford has widespread quality issues across many models and systems but Lincoln has it down to just amenities. It sounds like Ford's issues are related to their newer models around 2013. Ford has persistent quality issues with new car launches that are more significant than other makers.

Edited by BORG
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I've always wondered why Ford has such issues. Is it because of poor engineering, or cheapest supplier parts or poor assembly quality. Maybe a combination of them. I don't understand how such things like the 6f35 trans still has issues. It's 7 years old. The software stuff I get, but the hard parts, I don't.

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He wasn't making excuses, just explaining factors that led to the poor results.

 

You think numbers haven't improved (well, won't improve, as the study looks back years) since then?

Ford has problems with quality. The root causes has got to be found, or they will continue to slide downward.

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I've always wondered why Ford has such issues. Is it because of poor engineering, or cheapest supplier parts or poor assembly quality. Maybe a combination of them. I don't understand how such things like the 6f35 trans still has issues. It's 7 years old. The software stuff I get, but the hard parts, I don't.

 

 

It's probably a little of everything, it really has to be to have such widespread failures. Ford has had a very hard time adapting to it's globalized One Ford strategy which gutted much of the work that was done to get them to the top of the quality rankings just before One Ford. Obviously it has to get better because you can't do much worse than last place. The notorious build, engineering, and quality issues surrounding the new Focus, Fiesta, Fusion and Escape launched at the time have mostly been resolved, and MFT has been stabilized if not entirely fixed. It took a few years to sort out the transmission on Focus/Fiesta and the Escape/Fusion problems were mostly isolated to the first year. The next big problem will likely be the F-150 which had a rough launch with many people complaining of build issues after Ford turned off the quality control systems to speed up production, but I don't think the problems are as widespread. The remainder of the decade is mostly maintenance and MCEs so quality should stabilize, 2013 was a busy year. I don't think Ford has the same quality discipline before this decade happened because we are still seeing rocky launches like the Edge in with hundreds of cars being bought back, even my Dad's 2015 Edge has had countless issues which is a first for him in his Ford owning lifetime. It always gets better, but Ford hasn't figured out its launch problems and seems willing to live with it instead of holding back products like they use to. Lincoln seems to have the discipline however because I had to wait 6 months longer than anticipated to get my MKX order. Just don't buy the 1st MY of a Ford, or at least wait 6+ months.

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Fordtech... its engineering and tightwaddedness. Look how much they have scavenged labor times in the last few years. They will do ANYTHING to save a buck.

Labor times are ridiculous. But if they spend the money to build it right then the labor times won't be a huge issue for them because failure rate should be small. They are making large profits now so time to straighten this mess up. This reminds me of 99-03 Nasser days of cost cutting.

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Excuse implies it is something that doesn't need to be fixed.

 

Clearly Ford has problems that need to be fixed. Fixing launch problems is a little different than fixing other problems. And we haven't seen a repeat of the 2012 Escape and 2013 fusion/mkz launches, but they're still having too many issues on new products.

 

It's a combination of losing too many experienced engineers the last decade and moving too fast with some cost cutting measures making it worse - if I had to guess.

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EXCUSE definition

a reason that you give to explain why you have done something bad, or why you have not done something that you should have done

 

Ford has problems with quality. The root causes has got to be found, or they will continue to slide downward.

 

So we can't point out the reasons for the low ratings? We're supposed to just throw our hands up in the air and say we don't know why they happened, they just did? How do you fix a problem when pointing out the problem is labeled an excuse?

 

Nobody is arguing Ford has had quality issues, and that they obviously need to improve in that regard and focus more energy toward that to improve those numbers.

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It's a combination of losing too many experienced engineers the last decade and moving too fast with some cost cutting measures making it worse - if I had to guess.

 

+1

BlueOvalForums member theoldwizard, a retired Ford engineer, mentioned several anecdotes over the years that corroborate this.

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We should have expected some of these issues because history shows every Ford design that is brought over here from Europe has quality problems. Contour, Focus come to mind.

I was wondering what would happen when American and European Fords were co-developed under the "One Ford" program. My first experience with a European Ford was a new 1974 2800cc Capri. I was a Mustang buyer prior to that; but I could not stomach the Mustang II. Although the Capri was an enthusiast kind of car and very sporty, it was absolutely terrible build-wise. Many mechanical problems arose; followed by rusting out in just a few years. Years later, we bought an 1991 Escort GT which was part Mazda. This was one of the better Ford cars I ever owned. We then purchased an SVT Contour; although I was concerned about the quality coming from Europe. The result was eerily similar to the Capri. The mechanical problems just took all the pleasure out of owning such a car. The issues were not confined to any one particular area either. Fast forward to our 2011 Edge. After five years, it remains the most perfect Ford that we have ever owned (started buying new Fords in 1965). I may be wrong, but I think the 2011 Edge is not on a European based platform like the new Edge.

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