Consumer Complaints
| Fail date | miles | occurences | Purchase date |
|---|---|---|---|
| STEERING | |||
| 02/08/2013 | 24000 | ||
| Drove 30 miles at highway speed. then in shopping mall engine quit suddenly at 20 mph without any warning. no power brakes, no power steering. it was if someone had turned off the ignition. i was able to muscle the car out of traffic and was thankful this sudden failure did not occur at speed or while making a turn across traffic. this seems to be a problem identical to those reported by other 09 flex owners, but ford ( or at least my local dealer) is not interested in addressing the problem. considering that the car had a loss of control, it is puzzling that this defect is not being taken more seriously. in terms of severity of the problem, this sounds like a '10'. the proposed fix is new throttle body, reprogram computer, clean injectors. since no fault codes appeared and since this is intermittent, the mechanical breakdown policy does not cover what is clearly a manufacturing defect on these early builds. so the problem is twofold: the car dies suddenly and the computer does not recognize this as a fault. | |||
| 08/28/2009 | 3611 | 2 | |
| Twice while driving my ford flex, i had spontaneous total shut downs of the engine. the first time, my car was only a few months old and i was idling in front of a friend's house when all the lights came on and it completely died. i started it right back up (and it subsequently performed perfectly) and i drove it to ford where they did some diagnostics checks and found no anomaly. it concerned me but thinking it may be a fuel injection issue while only idling, i went about my business. on july 20, 2012, at 38k mile, my ford flex died again! total shutdown of the engine and all the lights came on while i was driving approximately 30 miles per hour with my daughter in the car! no power steering, no power brakes, no power anything! because i was on a slight downhill, i was able to get the car over to the side of the road without catastrophe, thank god. the engine started up again as if nothing occurred. i drove direct to ford where they did 10 minutes of diagnostic testing and told me once again that there was no anomaly. i went a little crazy, informed them that i was leaving for a 10- day vacation the following morning and that they had the full 10 days to fix the car or that i wasn't going to be picking it up ever again. a ford tech drove my car with a computer plugged into the car, typed in the problem and after maneuvering the car to try and get a repeated response, the car did indeed shut down while he was driving it! apparently, the throttle body was binding internally and needed to be replaced. after replacing part # 1 7t4z 9e926 fa, ford walnut creek ca is telling me it is fixed. let's hope so. i pray that no one has been involved in a fatal or injury accident as a result of this part's failure. i am writing this as an alert and a heads up to anyone who has had the same scary experience. *tr | |||
| 08/28/2009 | 3611 | ||
| Twice while driving my ford flex, i had spontaneous total shut downs of the engine. the first time, my car was only a few months old and i was idling in front of a friend's house when all the lights came on and it completely died. i started it right back up (and it subsequently performed perfectly) and i drove it to ford where they did some diagnostics checks and found no anomaly. it concerned me but thinking it may be a fuel injection issue while only idling, i went about my business. on july 20, 2012, at 38k mile, my ford flex died again! total shutdown of the engine and all the lights came on while i was driving approximately 30 miles per hour with my daughter in the car! no power steering, no power brakes, no power anything! because i was on a slight downhill, i was able to get the car over to the side of the road without catastrophe, thank god. the engine started up again as if nothing occurred. i drove direct to ford where they did 10 minutes of diagnostic testing and told me once again that there was no anomaly. i went a little crazy, informed them that i was leaving for a 10- day vacation the following morning and that they had the full 10 days to fix the car or that i wasn't going to be picking it up ever again. a ford tech drove my car with a computer plugged into the car, typed in the problem and after maneuvering the car to try and get a repeated response, the car did indeed shut down while he was driving it! apparently, the throttle body was binding internally and needed to be replaced. after replacing part # 1 7t4z 9e926 fa, ford walnut creek ca is telling me it is fixed. let's hope so. i pray that no one has been involved in a fatal or injury accident as a result of this part's failure. i am writing this as an alert and a heads up to anyone who has had the same scary experience. | |||