NHTSA issued a warning recently about the 1L turbocharged engine used in Fords between 2014 and 2021. The timing belt disintegrates and may clog the oil pickup screen, reducing oil throughput in the engine. As a result of past experience, Ford reduced the timing belt change interval to 100,000 miles from 150,000 miles. It may become a recall soon. Ford has been reimbursing owners for damage to their engines if they qualify.
The joy of a wet timing belt.
Poor design sure, but why is this a ford problem at 100k?
Because the belt is failing and killing oil circulation at 100k when Ford said belt replacement wasn’t needed until 150k.
The last paragraph in the article quotes average failure at 70,000 miles according to NHTSA data. I don’t know what the standard deviation of the failure curve is, but a recommendation if 100,000 miles for a belt change still means a lot of premature failures, far more than half.
Here’s what Gates has to say about these wet belts:
My goodness, 8-12 hours labor and special tools for a cost of $1,000 - $2,400 to replace a timing belt every 70,000 miles? And I thought that changing a dry belt on a V6 was a PITA.
What would it have cost Ford to instead use a proper timing chain that would last the life of the car ? An extra $100 on the MSRP?
Gates says that the replacement interval for the Honda V6 is 105,000 miles for regular service and 60,000 miles for severe service. I haven’t priced it yet, but I expect my 2019 Odyssey timing belt will cost in the $1000 to $2400 range you mention.
At the time, there wasn’t an alternative minivan we liked. Today I’d probably go for a Toyota Sienna. Maybe Mrs JT will want to trade in the van when I tell her we need a timing belt.
Reduced internal drag. Measures taken to improve fuel economy by as little as 0.1 mpg in pursuit of CAFE goals have over-complicated automobiles. The financial fuel economy penalty is likely greater than the cost of a timing chain.
Hybrid powertrains are probably the best way to attain CAFE standards, but they cost thousands more and there are buyers who do not want hybrid or CVT powertrains.
At it’s highest point the CAFE financial penalty was $17 per vehicle for each tenth of a mile the Standard was exceeded. So instead of an additional tenth of a mile per gallon, if we make the very generous assumption that the oiled belt gave a full additional MPG the CAFE penalty would only be $170 per vehicle.
Today with the cost of even the cheapest new car pushing $20,000, that $170 is less than 1% of the price and insignificant to practically any new car buyer,
As a former Vega owner, I think the best explanation is Detroit’s history of introducing cheap, untested innovations into it’s lowest profit entry level cars and then letting the owners do the beta testing. Short term profit over long term satisfaction but after my Vega experience I would never buy another GM product.
Seems like timing chains in newer cars have problems with tensioners and plastic guides.
Ford sold more than 2 million vehicles last year. The penalty would be applied to every vehicle in a particular class, not just the individual vehicles below CAFE standards. This is one reason low profit vehicles (compacts) have been discontinued, each vehicle would be subject to the penalty at the end of the year if the corporation did not achieve the goal.
Much like the 1980’s Toyota 22R? This is nothing new, there were lots of noisy timing chains 40 years ago. This is one reason timing belt engines remained in production for so long.
My daughter’s BMW had a recall because of the plastic chain guides. The new guides failed again just after her extended warranty expired. The dealer quoted $25,000 for a new engine this time but they settled for $6000.
I agree, timing chains are not unfallable, especially when the manufacturer goes cheepo and uses plastic chain guides like like Toyota did on the 22R and Jaguar did on the early XK-8s BUT …
- In both cases there was ample, audible early warning (chain slap) before the engine was destroyed.
- The solution (replace the plastic chain guide with an updated metal guide), while not cheap was a one time fix.
Contrast this with the Ford issue where there is no early warning and no permanent solution other than an expensive belt replacement every 70,000 miles.
Frankly, even if Ford didn’t want to go to the expense of a chain, the purchasers would have been better off with the common and much less expensive dry belt replacement schedule.
The mean time to failure as measured by mileage is 70,000 miles according to NHTSA. If I owned a car with this engine, I’d replace the timing belt at 50,000 miles, and certainly not past 60,000 miles. Waiting to 70,000 miles means there’s a 50/50 chance that the belt will fail before replacement, and that’s too sporting for me.
I know I won’t buy a car without a chain . I have never known the chains to be noisy and have driven them till like 170000 miles and never had an issue. I do change the oil right at 5000 miles.
I read somewhere that on Hondas v6 for their Ridgeline pickup they have to pull the whole cab off to do it , what’s that got to cost if true ?
Pretty sure that’s not true, it’s the same front end as the Pilot and Passport. Video I saw showed nothing unusual required.