Ford Engineers Say Ford Knew About Faulty Transmissions
Recently, several former and current Ford tech specialists have told the media that "everyone knew" about the faulty automatic transmissions in the Fiesta and Focus models. It is claimed that despite the fact that the issue was not a big secret before the cars hit the market, the company recommended its employees not to go public about this problem.
The problem is related to the DPS6 dual-clutch
PowerShift placed in 2 million Fiesta and Focus cars first produced in 2011 and
2012. The transmission was some kind of innovative solution for Ford in the
U.S., and it applied a dry-clutch technology that proved to be absolutely
inefficient in cooling itself, resulting in total breakdown of the unit.
Ford Powershifttransmission
During the past summer, there was a rumor that
Ford had known about the potential Powershift issues for the Fiesta and Focus
but didn't take the matter seriously, releasing the cars anyway. This rumor was
backed by internal documents spread by mass media, saying that the company
ignored lawyers and engineer concerns and refused to take any measures because
of high costs of the gearbox technology.
Faultiness of
the Powershift unit would manifest itself in vibrations, slippages, snatching,
hesitation during gear shifting, early wear of internal parts, operating
delays, in sometimes sudden or delayed acceleration. Since the transmissions
were supposed to shift to N gear when some issues would occur. As a result, drivers
would lose power intermittently.
Focus and Fiesta owners have filed more than
4,300 complaints with the NHTSA. According to media sources, transmission
issues have already stroke Ford with an assessed $3 bln in warranty costs, plus
growing court costs from numerous ongoing lawsuits. The U.S. Justice Department
has also started an investigation into the carmaker’s conduct in the matter
dating to 2010.
Moreover, a federal court in California is considering whether a $35 mln collective action settlement is fair to the affected party, and about 13,000 individual lawsuits are pending.
