Contour Enthusiasts Group Archives Forums General General Anyone with MTX-75 problems please read

I am currently fighting Ford to replace or refund my money on my 2000 CSVT. I know from posting and reading that many others have had their problems with the tranny as well. Is there any way to find out how many tranny replacements Ford did on Contours, or more specifically, the SVT? Any leads would be greatly appreciated, as I have a court date next week. If there are no leads, would everyone just reply as to what work was done, how many times, etc. Thanks. Ted.

Had mine rebuilt by local Ford house at around 30k. Replaced a few synchros, but thrid gear was giving me the most trouble. I just pulled the entire top shifting mech. out and replaced a simple bolt that the damn Ford dealer overtightened, causing it to break. The shifter had around 4-5 inches of play from 1-2, 3-4, etc. Forward and back. They would have said tough ****, so I got brave and pulled apart to look at it. The Ford service is second-rate at best (but you probably already know that.) Hope this helps. If you need more specific info. PM me and I'll see about getting you a copy of the service invoice.

I recently went through similar issues with my transmission. If I shift real slow, the gears grind, with the clutch pushed all the way to the floor. Had the clutch replaced at 16K because it was dragging (other posts suggest this was a manufacturing issue with Ford), although the dealer insisted that I beat on the vehicle. Tried to get my money back last November by taking the local Ford dealer (what a bunch of morons) to court. They dealer said this is a high performance car which is tended to be driven hard. Well, if it's such a high performance car, than the clutch/transmission should be matched to handle that. I was unable to test drive the car with the mediators, they drove it themselves and said the car drove perfectly. I brought printouts of other complaints from this forum, but nobody wanted to hear anything of them. Just to be safe, I'm buying an extended warranty so if(when) the transmission really breaks, I just pay $100 deductible. BYTW, I'm getting the extended plan through my credit unioin so I won't have to deal with those idiot Ford people any more!

hey- Thanks so much for replying so quickly. I might have to get in touch with you for that invoice solefood, see what else I can dig up first. Big question is can someone find out how many rebuilds or replaced transmissions Ford has done to SVT's? Some people here work at Ford, do they even track that kind of stuff, and is it publically available? Keep the info coming though. Thanks.

I had my MTX-75 replaced last year due to cold shift problems. It was covered under warranty.

Please keep us informed on what happens. Good luck!

I would love to go along on a dealer "roadtest" to see how they drive the car when they say it works perfectly. There is something to the debate about driving a car harder and having it work better but it shouldn't be a requirement. Especially when the vehicle hasn't warmed up yet. We should be able to expect our cars to work well no matter what our driving style is as long as we aren't mistreating them. For the record, my mtx shifts hard into 2nd gear when cold but I don't know what the state of the fluid mix in it is as I just got it. I am planning on doing the tranny cocktail very shortly so maybe my problem will go away. For now I just take it very easy for the first few miles. After it warms up it's smooth as glass so I don't think I have any synchro damage.

Karl

I'm still having shifting problems with my SVT even after numerous visits to the dealer . They keep telling me there's nothing wrong with it . I can tell you ... THERE IS !! I wish I could get as lucky as J-Lab did (getting it replaced) , I'd love to be able to enjoy driving my SVT as I should be able to . It's terribly frustrating ... stupid Ford .

I'm on my third tranny. Third gear ginding everytime. The first went at 7k miles they replaced it. At 14k miles same thing. After consulting a friend he suggested have them rebuild the tranny instead of replacing it. Since what they would do is send a tranny with the same problem. Just rebuild the tranny replacing the syncros with stronger ones. Ford did it surprisingly. Now I am at 18k miles and ok so far. Now I am just worried what will happen when the warranty runs out end of the year. I look forward to 21k miles then lets see if that worked.

We just bought a used T-Red 98.5 SVT. When shifting from first into second, I get the grind. Only that shift sequence though. Every other gear seems fine. Other than cold weather making it physically difficult to push the shifter into first or reverse at startup, the car seems fine. What is covered under the extended warranty?