Terry W

Here is one for you Crystal. I bought a 2005 King Ranch in 07 had it back to the Dealership 11 (ELEVEN) times for a brake problem. The brake pedal felt like an old rusty hinge every times you applied it. After the second time back I suggested it might be the master cylinder or booster. They totally ignored me. (I'm a master mechanic with 40 years experience) OK long story short. The last time back I got a new mechanic and I got to talk to him explained what was going on and suggested the master or booster. He said he tried the booster first, wasn't it but the master cyl fixed the problem. Great, not finished yet. Then I picked the vehicle up I noticed a medium size scratch on the drivers door (from someone who opened their door into my truck. This was the second time this happened at this dealership. First time I paid a hundred dollars to have the ding fixed. This time I had enough and wanted them to fix it right. The manager ended up touching it up with a brush, I wasn't pleased and after I talked to the owner the manager told me to leave and never come back. NICE. Woltz and Wind Ford Dealership Pittsburgh, Pa.

Oh by the way I need an exhaust manifold, do you think I should take it to them for the repair? Also whats the deal with the exhaust manifolds rotting away. Manifolds should last a long long time.

All The Best
Terry

Snowflake

If your a master tech with a 7 seven year old truck fix it yourself. I have and 11 with 87,000 kms on it it and have had it to the dealer once for a cat. I do all the trivial stuff myself and don't bitch on forums about stuff I can do myself.
The manifolds on the 5.4 are known to have issues along with Chev 6.0 and others.
You should have the tools and know how to repair your truck yourself, unless your worried about screwing up and having no one to bitch at but yourself.

Terry W

Well Snowflake I don't know about you but when I pay for a warranty I would like the dealer to stand behind it. It's people like you that let the dealers and factory make inferior products so that you can do their quality control for them. If the manifolds are a KNOWN problem then maybe more people should BITCH and then in the future there might be less KNOWN problems.

It's people like you that make a post as you just did that get nothing accomplished for anyone in a forum such as this one. My post was made to maybe catch the ear of Ford Service to maybe help improve their dealers service.

Talk about bitching, you know you just bitched about me bitching, so who is the bigger bitch?

GraveDigger85

Being a master ASE tech doesn't go very far. There's no set standards behind the automotive industry or qualifications that prove you know what you're doing or the required training(besides manufacture training to a point, not general school) that you've been through besides taking a test and being "certified" in something in as little as two years. What does that prove? The quality of technicians in dealerships is diminishing due to dealers don't want to pay techs top dollar for their knowledge, they'd rather hire two or three kids right out of auto school, bottom dollar pay with no experience that can try to produce three times amount of work that one tech can produce three times the salary. I've seen it at a local dealership where I live, new management comes in and you don't want to play by their rules, hit the bricks yourself or they escort you to the curb. Also warranty pay is in the toilet so they are trimming labor times for the same amount of work involved to get the job done, so techs are rushing playing catch up all day to make the same or more amount of hours than they actually worked in a day. Quality control in the repair industry=becoming a thing of the past.

cford716

Run, run as fast as you can!

GraveDigger85

Haha, even trickles into the parts department.

Snowflake

I'm lucky because I do have 2 good dealerships nearby. But if my truck was 7 years old I wouldn't be going there unless I was to busy to fix it at my shop. I hear you on ASE certs just from being on other forums it don't mean much.
If I need warranty work I go to the dealer, all the brake service oil changes and such I do myself. I only have 12,000 kms left of warranty and my truck just turned 3.

Terry W

So if your vehicle was under warranty you would take it
back to the dealer. That's just what I did. Eleven times for the same problem.
As far as my qualifications, let's see 15 years at the dealers as lead tech 5 years my own shop. 27 years lead tech with the worlds largest fleet. My present job required me to be better then 33,000 applicants, they hired two. I was first. I don't think I'm scared to do an exhaust manifold on a 5.4 Do I want to do a PITA job because ford use inferior metal heck no. Maybe it doesn't bother you but it sure bothers the crap out of me.

HCFX2013

The dealer that I bought my new FX4 from is excellent. They fixed all of the pre-existing issues on the '11 when the other dealers dicked around, and tried their best to diagnose all of the new issues that kept coming up and offered an ultimate resolution of a heavy discount on a new truck. I tried 3 others before I ended up at my dealer.

No complaints here other than NO DAMN LOANERS! Huge PITA to have to take a cab (albeit, free) to my job across the city. Are you listening, Ford? You should have loaner vehicles available! Cabs are not convenient for us working people!

NASSTY

Maybe loaners should be included in the warranty, but in the US loaners are a dependent on the dealers. Some dealers (like mine) supply a loaner if your vehicle is in for service and some don't.