2015 ford feista clutch warranty denied by ford

[scoob]

FORD DENIED MY CLAIM EVEN THOUGH I HAVE ONLY HAD MY VEHICLE FOR 17 MONTHS WITH 17K MILES. SHAME ON YOU FORD.

I purchased a brand new Ford Fiesta ST from Sheehy Ford in Warrenton Virginia. I have owned the car for 17 months and it has 17K miles on it currently. My wife is the only driver of this car and she has been driving a vehicle with a clutch for 31 years with no clutch failures in all her time driving a vehicle with a clutch.

On July 31st 2016 my wife was coming home from dropping our daughter off at work and all of a sudden with no warning at all, the clutch in the vehicle failed to operate leaving my wife stranded in the middle of a busy road.

The vehicle was towed to the dealer where we purchased it and it sat there for three days. I asked the service tech what he thought was wrong with the car and he said he felt confident that it was the master slave cylinder that was faulty and that it would be covered under warranty. Fast forward to the day they removed the transmission for further inspection/diagnosis and they determined that the clutch was the culprit and that it was due to improper operation or abuse.

My wife is 50 years old and has been driving a car with a standard transmission for over thirty years and has never abused any of her vehicles. Stating that it was improperly driven is an insult and saying it was abused is pure speculation I firmly believe this clutch was defective and failed prematurely. I escalated this issue up to Ford's customer service reps and they all determined the same thing the dealer determined. They flat out denied my warranty claim based upon pictures and based upon a determination from the dealer that the clutch was abused or improperly driven. I spoke with a few professionals and distributed the photos of the clutch online and everyone I spoke to said that a clutch should last at minimum of 60K miles and most should last much longer to even 160K miles. The dealer claimed that this was a high performance clutch and I made the statement that if it is a high performance clutch then why did it fail prematurely?

This car is still under the manufacturers bumper to bumper 3 year 36K miles warranty and there is no reason this clutch should have failed other than it was defective or installed incorrectly at the factory.

Now they want us to pay nearly $2,000 dollars to replace a clutch in a vehicle that we only paid $20K within less than 18 months of ownership.

I have contacted my local ABC, and NBC news outlets to further make aware the problems I am having with Ford and to vet my severe dissatisfaction with the way you treat your customers and the fact you are not standing behind a product you make.

Attached are some photos of a clutch that failed at 17K miles. I have a 2004 Subaru with the original clutch of which I took with me to Germany while I was deployed with the military. I drove this car on the German Autobahn and once around the famed Nurburgring and it still shows no signs of even the beginnings of a failure, yet I buy a car that is marketed as a performance vehicle from Ford and I can not even get through two years of ownership and I am being forced to pay for a clutch that failed way before it's time. If you value me as a customer, please step up to the plate and fix this problem.

V/r

Steven Watts

 

[re-rx7]

Clutch is wear item. Wear items are not covered. They can usually tell if its abuse. I saw a Focus RS come in that shredded the clutch after only 2k miles. Upon disassembly they could see where the clutch failed due to a rivet popping. A bad clutch I.e failed spring, rivet, will show itself pretty quickly. Even a misadjusted clutch will show sign of being just that out of spec. Im sure you have driven this vehicle aggressively at some point. You even state that you are a performance oriented person. Simple fact...Wear items are not covered.

Edit: saw the pics. That's def abuse. Hot spots everywhere.

 

[scoob]

Obviously you did not read the whole post. My wife is the only person who drives the car and she does so not in a performance oriented manner. Besides an improperly installed or designed master slave cylinder can cause this type of malfunction as well. It can cause the clutch to not engage properly which can cause overheating which can lead to this type of failure. The slave cylinder is covered under warranty. The only part of the clutch that is not covered is the clutch liner.

 

[scoob]

Clutch is wear item. Wear items are not covered. They can usually tell if its abuse. I saw a Focus RS come in that shredded the clutch after only 2k miles. Upon disassembly they could see where the clutch failed due to a rivet popping. A bad clutch I.e failed spring, rivet, will show itself pretty quickly. Even a misadjusted clutch will show sign of being just that out of spec. Im sure you have driven this vehicle aggressively at some point. You even state that you are a performance oriented person. Simple fact...Wear items are not covered.

Edit: saw the pics. That's def abuse. Hot spots everywhere.

Car was never abused. You make a claim as if you were there, but you were not.

 

[re-rx7]

Easy to read a clutch gd sir.

 

[scoob]

Seems you left a few chapters out troll.

 

[Seijou]

My question is how will this thread be beneficial to your case? We've seen your other thread/posts and we can sympathize with you, but throwing a fit at Ford won't help in the slightest. My advice was, and still remains that you should communicate with the dealership and get a discounted repair. We all have issues and bad luck, etc. but we have to deal with it. IMHO, you cannot prove that your wife is a driver who 'knows how to drive manual' or 'does not drive in a performance oriented manner', etc. but they CAN prove that they see signs of abuse on the equipment. As stated before by another member who had a friend that went through this issue, you likely will not win this battle. I am not an expert by any means, but I can understand this scenario.

Will you spend money on lawyer fees, or will you spend a significantly less amount of money to just repair the clutch and move on? I also understand you are upset at Ford, but nobody twisted your arm and forced you to buy a Ford vehicle. We all made these decisions on our own.

Hope none of this comes off as rude. All the best.

Seems you left a few chapters out troll.

Honestly, these are the same (community of) people you're asking for help in your other thread. If you cannot win with good argument and reason, please do not resort to this.

 

[re-rx7]

Seems you left a few chapters out troll.

You can be mad. I'm just stating what I see. The clutch has hotspots and glazing. This is typical of a clutch that has been worked over pretty hard. Look at some pics of burnt clutches on google. You will see what I'am talking about. Also, I have been on this forum far longer than you. Just because I tell you what I see does not make me a troll.

-cheers

 

[Intuit]

Dupe Thread...

http://www.fiestastforum.com/forum/...-at-the-Moment?p=174405&viewfull=1#post174405

 

[richtor]

We have clutch that shows signs of wear and the op believes it can't be because it's his wife who's driving it.

Has the op made effort to get a clutch expert to look at said clutch? If so what did the expert say, wear or a default when new clutch? This would be far more beneficial than complaining online.

So far all we have is op is right and everyone who looks at the clutch is wrong.

 

[Intuit]

I don't think the poster is saying that 'everyone who looks at the clutch is wrong,' just that his wife didn't create and isn't responsible for the damage. He's standing by his wife... and you can't blame a man for that.

I do not know how the hydraulics are designed in this vehicle, but in my other Ford, it would be nearly impossible for the hydraulics to be responsible for overheating a clutch.

Conceptually speaking, you can replace our hydraulic system with a metal rod... that in a hyper-simplistic fashion, would explain it's function. It's basic function is to transmit the movement of your foot, to the transmission. The transmission uses that force to *release* the clutch disc from the clutch plate, which effectively disengages the engine from the transmission.

In order for the hydraulic system to be responsible for that problem, it would have to be designed to operate in reverse of how they're typically designed. In other words, it would need to be responsible for engaging the clutch, rather than releasing it.

Hydraulics almost never seize. When they do fail, they do however leak, or loose pressure. Based on typical clutch system designs, such problems result with disengagement problems, rather than engagement problems. This means you may have problems grinding and getting your shifter in/out of gear with the engine running and/or the vehicle moving. People often mistake such problems for issues with the synchronizers and vice-versa. The hydraulics we use can be considered as "light-duty" hydraulics. These "light duty" hydraulics typically slow-fail, work intermittently with temperature variations for a time, as opposed to going out all at once.

In a nutshell, it would be unlikely that your wife had a seizing master or slave cylinder.

 

[OCS12]

Obviously you did not read the whole post. My wife is the only person who drives the car and she does so not in a performance oriented manner. Besides an improperly installed or designed master slave cylinder can cause this type of malfunction as well. It can cause the clutch to not engage properly which can cause overheating which can lead to this type of failure. The slave cylinder is covered under warranty. The only part of the clutch that is not covered is the clutch liner.

Hate to say it, but I'm with those that say this was an abused clutch. Before you come back with the same old argument, I am NOT saying your wife was out driving like a teenager who stole dad's car.

I've only got twenty year's experience in almost all manual cars, but one thing I know is that while different cars might have a similar clutch feel, they sure don't act the same. She may have been riding the clutch without even knowing it. I burned up one in my Subaru years ago, exactly that way. Going from a Dakota to a 2.5 RS, let's just say the clutch was a lot lighter than I was used to. It was my fault.

 

[rexdriver85]

From looking at the pics in the other thread, there is no two ways about it. This clutch was abused at some point. Maybe not by your wife, but by the previous owner. That flywheel is glazed and heat spotted to heck. You have to remember these technicians deal with this kind of stuff on a daily basis. Not saying all dealerships and technicians out there are good at what they do, because they certainly aren't. But any technician who's been doing the job for a number of years can spot the difference between abuse failures and pre-mature mechanical failures, etc.

I know it sucks. I know it's going to be expensive. I know it's a "new" car. But as they say... it is what it is.

Hopefully someone close can help you. Good luck, again.

 

[koozy]

the back story and who drives the car is irrelevant. the only thing that matters are the parts involved and how they look.

 

[rexdriver85]

the back story and who drives the car is irrelevant. the only thing that matters are the parts involved and how they look.

Indeed. And that's exactly why the claim was denied. It's pretty cut and dry in this case.

 

[M-Sport fan]

From looking at the pics in the other thread, there is no two ways about it. This clutch was abused at some point. Maybe not by your wife, but by the previous owner. That flywheel is glazed and heat spotted to heck. You have to remember these technicians deal with this kind of stuff on a daily basis. Not saying all dealerships and technicians out there are good at what they do, because they certainly aren't. But any technician who's been doing the job for a number of years can spot the difference between abuse failures and pre-mature mechanical failures, etc.

I know it sucks. I know it's going to be expensive. I know it's a "new" car. But as they say... it is what it is.

Hopefully someone close can help you. Good luck, again.

He and his wife were the only owners, but yes, ANY other person, driving it for even the shortest amount of time could possibly do that damage (valets, yahoo service techs, or 'washers/lot boys' at the dealer, ANYONE), so yes, it might not even be scoob's OR his wife's fault, but the dealer does not know that, nor can it be their concern, sadly enough.

THIS is WHY I am willing to wait 3+ months for an ordered car instead of just grabbing what is on a dealer's lot (as much as the sales people try to push you to do so), or located from another dealer's lot (where you MUST 'trust' the one driving it back), NEVER EVER let a valet, or lot attendant drive my cars, and ALWAYS ride along in the passenger seat when my f'ing state's s****y, corrupt inspection system requires the 'techs' to test drive your car in order to pass, and do not lend my cars to ANYONE!!

 

[rexdriver85]

He and his wife were the only owners, but yes, ANY other person, driving it for even the shortest amount of time could possibly do that damage (valets, yahoo service techs, or 'washers/lot boys' at the dealer, ANYONE), so yes, it might not even be scoob's OR his wife's fault, but the dealer does not know that, nor can it be their concern, sadly enough.

THIS is WHY I am willing to wait 3+ months for an ordered car instead of just grabbing what is on a dealer's lot (as much as the sales people try to push you to do so), or located from another dealer's lot (where you MUST 'trust' the one driving it back), NEVER EVER let a valet, or lot attendant drive my cars, and ALWAYS ride along in the passenger seat when my f'ing state's s****y, corrupt inspection system requires the 'techs' to test drive your car in order to pass, and do not lend my cars to ANYONE!!

Whoops, I swore he said he bought it used. My fault, there's a lot going on with this one and the different threads on the topic.

I agree with what you said there. When I purchased mine, it had 8 miles on it. The sales guy and I walked over to look at it, he jumped in, said to me hop in, and proceeded to slip the clutch and buck the car around. I said STOP right now or I'm leaving and you lose a sale. He agreed, lol. I'm not confident, but with 8 miles on it, I *think* that was the only bout of abuse it ever got. But, you never know. A lot could have happened in those 8 miles.

When the trans was dropped, and the clutch was taken out I guarantee the tech immediately said ABUSE! The other bad thing about flat-rate. Warranty times pay JACK. That tech will get paid more money if it's a customer pay job, and after looking at the damages that's what he was hoping on.

It's a crappy situation for sure.

 

[Quisp]

My clutch had a failure of the clutch release. They covered new clutch under warranty. Maybe the fact that they did an engine replacement a few thousand miles before . If the clutch wasn't fully disengaging that would cause wear and hot spots.

 

[BobMaxed]

Note: Failure to fully depress the clutch
pedal to the floor may cause increased shift
efforts, prematurely wear transmission
components or damage the transmission.

This comes from the Fiesta owners manual. And maybe all car companies with manual tran cars say this. It does seem like a waste of time and energy to push the pedal all the way to the floor. But after reading about cars with burnt out clutches in this forum I'm trying to be more careful with mine.

 

[BiigMe]

Hey man, what you should do is contact every Ford higher up you can. Post this on reddit.com/r/cars and reddit.com/r/FiestaST those communities are slightly bigger, especially /r/cars. Tweet Ford help every day, just make a big scene online and I'm sure someone will see it, then they'll want you to stop posting about it and it should get fixed. Sad, but the only real way to get a company to notice you these days is to make a big enough stink that they would rather fix the problem then have you tell everyone what happened. Hell that guy on /r/cars got a Focus RS after Ford lost his because he made a big enough post that someone noticed and wanted to fix the bad PR.