The Associated Press ran a story on Yahoo today about the recent Ford Windstar recall due to the rear axle failing on older model Windstars (1998-2003). This article hit me particularly hard because that's the vintage of Windstar we owned and had scrapped right at the same time as this recall.
See full story here http://news.yahoo.com/s/ap/us_ford_windstar_recall
Since scrapping our 1998 Windstar this past August, I felt like we had dodged a bullet. We had gotten rid of the van just in time before any serious repair problems cropped up. And today, I'm reading about fatal accidents from rear axle failure and thinking how lucky we were to having gotten rid of the car when we did. The timing of the recall and the scrapping of the van is sobering.
Ford announced on Aug. 27 that it was recalling 575,000 older-model Windstars in the U.S. and Canada. The recall covered vehicles from model years 1998 to 2003 that were sold in states where the heavy use of road salt can cause more corrosion, including New England, the mid-Atlantic and the Great Lakes region.
The automaker said that as of September, 950 complaints about the axles were filed with NHTSA, the most recent figures available. The Center for Auto Safety, a consumer safety group, said the defect had been blamed for eight crashes and three injuries as of September.I scrolled back through the old posts and by total coincidence, my first blog post http://carfreeinannarbor.blogspot.com/2010/08/day-1-without-car.html was dated August 28, one day after the Ford announcement of a recall.
Feeling lucky in Ann Arbor
Astrid
No comments:
Post a Comment