Beating a dead horse here....tboner I hate to tell you that recalls are not just for safety reasons. In fact, that is my one gripe, well one of MANY, with Ford. A safety recall (aka: fan fuse) is a must change regardless of miles/years. A NON-safety recall is NOT changed unless broken and if said part breaks after "time limit or miles/years listed" then YOU have to pay for it. Namely, heater blower switch (which was the original post), heater blower resistor (which I had to pay b/c my 6yrs/76K was up on), dashboard warping...I could go on. So before you make that assumption, check the facts (and yes I am VERY bitter about it). I paid 14K for a car with a working blower switch and resistor, normal dashboard and the 10 other recalls that were issued on my car (not including the 6 safety ones), I shouldn't have to put out extra money. We're not talking brakes, engine, tranny, and other 7 year maintenance issues, you know, these are parts that Ford knows there is a problem with and I shouldn't have to pay for it.
Originally posted by 7999:
If you find a good dealership service department they love to do recall work. The dealership gets paid by Ford for doing the work. Ford has to pay the dealership for the recall service work.
If I need repair work did, I usually call several dealerships on the phone and explain my problem to them. Sometimes one dealership will give me a price of repair of $500 and another will do the work for free under recall work. Before paying a lot of money check with more than one dealership.
I was told by my local dealership that the mechanic prefered not to work on recalls because they didn't make money off the deal. Ford only pays a set amount regardless of the time he would have to spend to change my wire-harness for example. Only take your car to a dealer if necessary, or if you have a good dealer. If you do..congrats! Can I move by you?
As for the TBS...if I ONLY would have known that in 1998, when I brought my car in for an AC leak in the passenger floor, that Ford had released a TBS stating that they had redesigned the evaporator box and it was covered under the bumper to bumper warranty. I had NO idea...Ford didn't bother to change it...and 4 years later I put out $400 for the box and $360 for the labor (my mechanic did the work). Ford does not in ANY way advertise that there may be problems with the vehicles and furthmore, I wasn't notified that there were outstanding recalls on the car since I bought it used and the previous owner didn't have the car serviced. Had I been told that my car had 16 recalls and 106 service bulletins on it, I probably wouldn't have bought it, regardless of how much fun is was (and still is) to drive.
Like I said..beating a dead horse...sorry guys!
