Overview
- This week NHTSA upgraded a multi-year defect investigation into roughly 135,000 Ford Fiesta, Focus and EcoSport cars with the 1.0L engine after receiving 355 reports of low oil pressure followed by sudden loss of power or engine seizure.
- Preliminary teardown work found timing-belt material can shed, creating debris that clogs the mesh oil-pump pick-up screen and cuts oil flow to the engine, which can cause loss of oil pressure and catastrophic seizure with little warning.
- Reported failures average about 70,000 miles and 98% occurred well before Ford’s previous 150,000-mile timing-belt interval, suggesting the problem appears at much lower mileage than expected.
- Ford told NHTSA in June it would run a non-safety customer satisfaction program that shortens the timing-belt interval to 100,000 miles (six years) and offers some reimbursements, but regulators say they must complete the engineering analysis before they can compel a safety recall.
- Owners face safety risk on roads and large repair bills for seized engines, and because the affected models are discontinued this could complicate service, warranty support and owners’ ability to get repairs covered if NHTSA orders a recall.