Hello to everyone!
Back in 1998, I had the pleasure of leasing a 1998.5 Contour SVT, which was my beloved chariot and Jetta/GTI beater for 2 years. Beautiful car, tons of fun at the track, never one problem even after 2 years of hard driving. When the lease came up, I sadly returned the SVT and, looking for a cheaper car with good rebates, picked up a 1999 Contour SE V6. That's when my problems began.
After 14,000 miles, the car developed a loud ticking sound at idle, which would go away when the revs came up. The dealer said that oil starvation caused by an "assembly issue" had caused the crank to "fall into" (their words) one of the main bearings. One brand-new engine later and the problem was solved. To me this wasn't a big deal because I didn't pay a dime for it, had a free rental for 2 weeks, and got the car back in great shape. I tried to dig into the issue a bit on my end using some of my old Ford contacts, but found nothing concrete outside of engine assembly horror stories.
At about 20,000 miles, the manual shifter gave up the ghost and wouldn't let me shift into 1st gear. The rear doors also started developing seam rust at the bottom, which Ford said they couldn't do anything about because it hadn't "broken through" yet. Hrmm. The door switches also crapped out one after the other.
At about 35,000 miles, the transmission started grinding severely when shifting from 1st to 2nd. The dealer said that the transmission had "bearing issues" due to "excessive initial wear of a synchronizer" (their words). 2 weeks with a rental Taurus and one new tranny later (covered under warranty), the problem was solved. The rust on the rear doors was getting worse, but still hadn't broken through yet so I have to live with it. So much for the extended warranty covering rust.
Now at 45,000 miles, my Contour has developed a strange electrical malady. The battery light will come on out of nowhere and everything electrical runs as though it has no voltage regulator. The engine still runs fine, no strange noises at all, but there's something truly off on the electrical side of things. I'm going to get it looked at this week. Luckily, it's still covered under the extended warranty. Oh yeah, the door switches have crapped out YET AGAIN, and the door rust has gotten worse but hasn't broken through.
The funny thing is, even after all this, I still love the Contour. This is probably mostly due to great dealer service. If the dealership would have treated me like an idiot, I would probably feel different about things. They always give me a rental, they always tell me exactly what's wrong, and I always get the car back clean and in a relatively timely fashion.
I just wanted to share the "fun" I've had thus far, and see if any others have had similar issues. I'm truly not abusive whatsoever to the car, as I get all that out of my system on my motorcycle.
Thanks for reading!
Adam Strean
1999 Contour SE V6
