Contour Enthusiasts Group Archives Forums General Troubleshooting Another SVT Engine Is Dead!

DUDE!...I'm from Portland! Thomason is terrible!
I brought my Probe gt there 4 years ago to fix a little problem and it was a total fiasco. I hope it all works out

Just visited my Mother today, and she has her Odessey van in at the Honda dealer on extended warrantee repair (for the slide door auto motor). That van has like 75,000 miles on it. And guess what my Mother was driving in the meantime while Honda has her car? Yep, a little Accord that sais: 'Dewey Griffin Honda Courtesy Car' on the side! That's what you should be getting. WOW! No wonder everyone's switching over to Hondas n stuff. Would Ford ever do that?

SVTMike,

I found no records pertaining to service history with previous owner. He said all work was done at the dealer, which I believe. Car was perfect in everyway. I am guessing they looked at what had been done prior to me owning it...

Icey Mike,

Ford requires it in order to honor the warranty I am guessing. They wanted physical proof that I had taken care on the car in good faith. I am begining to think my next car will not be Ford or American as this whole mess has left me pretty bitter.

Shaun G,

I had a fairly good experience over a year ago, but it has been TERRIBLE this time. Service advisers have NO clue about what goes on in the shop. I had to call to get any info. Is truely sad that they are a Saleen dealer and and SVT dealer.... I posted over in the NW Forum about them.

Josch,

It is sad that Ford is very unconsistant in dealing with customers. In all my Ford years (18years) I have never had such a bad experience. The only way I can think of to force Ford to change is to take my business elsewhere. I have been actively looking at new Maxima's / Lexus IS300 and a few other cars since this has ocurred. My parents both agree that they will also go else where when considering a new car. I doubt they will look overseas for their next ride, but I am pretty sure they are done with Ford as well.... I still haven't made up my mind what to do completely, as I really like the Contour SVT...

Thanks everyone for your replies!

Volcano God

Well, at least they are honoring the Warrany and replacing your engine. If it was my car and the engine developed the problem while THEY test drove it and then they gave me a hard time about honoring the warrany; I would definately raise hell. Reading these stories alone makes me shudder at the thought of buying another Ford.

My dealer (Larry Renaud Ford in Harrow, Ontario Canada) has courtesy cars available. Other dealers in the area have them too, but only if you bought the extended warranty (I didn't). It's your dealer who decides whether to make courtesy cars available or not, not FoMoCo or Honda. But I guess Ford could encourage their dealers to offer courtesy cars, maybe by making it a requirement for "Blue Oval Certification" or something.

I was going to recommend checking out different dealers for different service policies before you buy your car, but I guess if you're getting an SVT, you probably only have one dealer in the area that's an SVT dealer, so my suggestion would be useless.

Bob

So it appears there is a huge difference in service levels between the various dealers. I was told by Ford Customer care (Corporate) that they (dealership) would have paid for a rental if I had bought and serviced my car there. I really think that is a terrible idea to base your service level on your loyalty to a particular dealer, but that is just me though.

Thanks,

Volcano God

All I know, is that my mother sais that owning her Honda throughout it's 75k has been nothing short of perfect. Her dealer has honored everything in warrantee as agreed. Not to mention, her Honda has had less problems throughout it's lifespan compared to my Contour, by far! Only once, they did kinda hassle her about an intermittant CEL code, but I told her not to shut the car off next time the CEL light was on (so it wouldn't go out), and so she just waited til it was on again and took it to them again (so they would at least check the codes). And once she did, they gladly took it in and found a dirty EGR valve and cleaned without problem or dispute.

As far as this comment goes:
I just wanted to say, that... did you know that MANY Japanese cars are actually built in plants right here in the US, by American Union workers? Yes sir ree. More and more Japanese plants are being built in th US everyday, because it's way cheaper for them to build them here (to avoid import taxes), and still sell them to us.

Yup... Most of the top Japanese sellers are mostly made in the good Ole USA. The Maxima is still made in Japan, but that is changing with next years car.. You guess it... It's going to be build somewhere in North America.

Why is it our American Car makers still struggle to get it right, or at least somewhat right. I realize the old saying grass is greener also applies to car manufactures, I just wish someone would water and fertilize the American car manufactures with something besides piss and fish poo (Use your on ingredients if you like...)

I mean no disrespect toward they guys slaving day in and out putting American cars together, my frustration lies with the Accounting for not fostering good innovation and financially supporting Engineering's ideas to production. Just look at Ford of EU versus North American Ford..... SUV's Road hog gas guzzling Trucks and the such seems to be Fords only focus here in North America. Sure I would love a truck, but not at a cost of 16-17MPG. Ramble Ramble Ramble... Sorry!!!
 
Volcano God

My brother always put it like this: He sais that Americans were always good at inventing things and thinking up new ideas. While the Japs would always tend to place their main focus (and R&D $$$) into refinment and perfection of existing ideas and technologies. I kinda got to agree with that statement to a certain extent. They were the last to switch over from carburetors to electronic eng management in cars (just one simple example). They would wait until we wasted all our money to fix many of the big bugs in electronic eng management, and then they'd take over from there. But someone's gotta be the trend setter too (US), always looking for new ideas and technologies, but unfortunatly we can't always refine those ideas that we invent, because sometimes you need an independent party to take a fresh approach to the redesigning of that thing (from a fresh perspective). Just my possibly worthless opinion

It sounds like alot of us have had bad experiences with Warranty work. In all honesty, since I found my current dealership, I have had nothing bad to say. They have covered many, many claims. I have had a Very problematic past. One I had them look at a faulty MAF sensor while I still had the KKM/Vortech 73MM MAF on the car. They told me what the problem was, I went home and swapped back to the stock airbox and when I returned it, they replaced the part... All for the $50 deductable that the Platinum Warranty calls for. No hassles really. I will buy a Ford again (but only from Pioneer Ford) because I want to keep the relationship with my Service Advisor.