I was on MSN and found this interesting bit of info about the wonderful Found On Road Dead company. Will there be a congressional hearing into Ford? DETROIT — Ford and U.S. safety regulators have agreed to a greatly expanded recall of the best-selling vehicle in North America, the Ford F-150 pickup truck, regulators said Thursday. The recall is for a possible short circuit that could cause airbags to deploy unexpectedly, and involves nearly 1.2 million F-150 pickup trucks and few Lincoln Mark LT vehicles, said the U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration.The recall affects trucks from the model years 2004 to 2006 and Lincoln Mark LTs from model year 2006. In February, Ford agreed to recall more than 150,000 of the trucks. The expansion comes after talks between the automaker and the safety regulators in Washington. On Thursday U.S. safety regulators said that Ford will add to the recall because the trucks' air bags can go off unexpectedly and injure drivers. Ford had resisted expanding the recall. Earlier this week, Ford said supply disruptions stemming from the earthquake in Japan could hurt earnings. The disclosure came in a securities filing with U.S. regulators Monday. The U.S. automaker, which has no auto plants in Japan but uses suppliers based there, said it was looking for alternate sources of auto parts as necessary. The filing was the first formal warning to investors from a U.S. automaker that missed shipments of parts from Japan could have far-reaching effects on financial performance. "Because the situation in Japan continues to develop, supply interruptions related to other materials and components from Japan could manifest themselves in the weeks ahead," the company said in the filing. As always link to original: Ford recalling 1.2 million F-150 pickups - Business - Autos - msnbc.com
"Ford said it knows of no crashes caused by the airbag problem. But NHTSA said in a January letter to Ford that the agency knew of 269 cases in which the air bags deployed inadvertently, resulting in 98 injuries, some serious."
Hey, there may not have been any crashes, those 98 injuries could all be bloody noses and black eyes cause by being hit in the face by a deploying airbag!
I think there's been a lot of luck at play for no crashes from those 98 injuries or even the other cases. I would think an airbag randomly going off in your face would scare the bejeezus out of just about anyone! The injures would definitely cause a distraction and potentially some loss of control of the vehicle. I am glad that the recall has been expanded, but a little disappointed at FORD for not doing it originally. Did they learn nothing from the Toyota issues of not expanding in the beginning?? While I don't see the inadvertent airbag deployment being a safety issue in and of itself, the fact that it can happen to the driver makes it one, IMO.
A report on the radio indicated that the deployments generally happened while starting, which would explain the lack of crashes. I haven't yet seen this in print.
The airbag going off is a safety issue. When choosing between having your head jammed into a steering wheel or an airbag, by all means choose the airbag. When choosing between normal driving and a slap in the face by explosive pillow bags and a release of fine particulate, I would say the choice is obvious. Airbags do cause injuries, but nothing as serious as what would usually happen when they are supposed to go off. But of course this won't make it to tv, and nobody will explode their airbags at ford dealerships to get out of their leases...
Can you imagine how embarassing that must be? You're on a date leaving the restaurant, turn on your car and BAM. Don't look so cool in your truck now, do you? Bite me Mike Rowe.
well I have some list here of the ford recalls made, but the recalls made are the old models of the ford. One recall for airbag but it still unknown for the ford company what model is the recall. for more info about this take a look at the Ford repair questions.
I would be scared to ever turn a key or hit a button again if a giant jack in the box exploded in my face just once.
Oh great, so if a short circuit triggered at ignition caused the car to catch on fire, someone could argue that the defect isn't responsible for any crashes?
Correct. I believe all of the Fords that combusted spontaneously were parked. I believe the cause was eventually traced to a short in the cruise control. Ford's advice was to park in the street so your garage wouldn't catch fire.
