Peoples standards are too high, trucks are not built like they use to be. They have become more refined and are made for the daily driver not the worker in the field. Any vehicle in any brand will have it's bad ones. My truck is a 97 with 140K on it and I've replaced a few parts but overall for it's age and milage it's done pretty well (just won a truck show with it). It's had two sets of front pads, 1 set of rears, front hub bearings, 3 sets of plugs and wires, 1 DPFE sensor. I bought the truck used and that's about all I know about what's been done. I will agree Ford's paint jobs suck but so does Dodge. Look at any Ram older than about a 96 and you will eventually see where they used bad primer.
I had one loyal Ford owner come in to my work to say he was tired of Ford and bought a 99 Chevy, he now wishes he hadn't. He had major engine problems, axle failure, power window switches, and ripped seats.
A buddy just bought a 74 Ford F250 highboy with a 390 in it, now that's a tough truck but the driveabilty and comfort is zip.

 

I must be one of the success stories with customer svc and reliability then Nothing major has happened with this truck in the three years I've owned it. I was 2k away from my 75k ext warranty running out, and the doors started rusting. The bodyshop manager at Tommie Vaughn Ford in Houston came out and looked at it for 5 minutes. He stands up straight, looked me in the eye, and asked what day would be convienient for me to bring it in. So, now there I was, 73,000 miles, and getting brand new doors and tailgate!! I also was only charged $13 a day for the rental FOCUS. $97 for brand new doors and a tailgate at 73k is one hell of a bargain in my book. All your problems seem to be the dealers you guys bought from. Ask around about your local dealer WAY before you buy from them. A good deal is only as good as their svc dept. They don't seem to realize that eventually crappy svc will catch up with them and hurt their sales. I bought my trucked used, and I still got fantastic svc!!!,,,,98

 

Kinda sucks you have had all those problems with your truck. My 1999 F-150 is about to hit 51,000 miles and I have'nt had one thing go wrong yet. In my opinion the F-150 is the most dependable truck you can get. I live in Alaska about a hundred or so miles from the arctic circle and during the winter the temperature seems to like to drop to minus -60F and at that temperature most vehicles don't start even when they are plugged in. All I can say is that at that temperature most vehicles that are not plugged in will not start at all, but the funny thing is that I never plug my truck in and have'nt for the three winters that I have had my truck. When the temperature starts to get between -40 and -50 the only vehicles you predominately see on the highways up here are Ford's. It could be attributed to the fact that Ford comes up here almost every winter to cold weather test their vehicles and the other automakers do not (VW comes up to do cold weather testing here as well), but perhaps I am just lucky. By the way Tundra's do not do well in very cold weather up here. The Tundra doesn't like to start when the temperature starts to approach 0F, but I am not saying it is unreliable just not as dependable as the the F-150's are when it starts to get real cold.

 

0F degrees????? Jeez I don't blame it for not starting...I wouldn't start if it's that cold!

 

I had my new truck less than two weeks and it wouldn't start.
I called the dealer and they came out, looked the truck over and came to their conclusion.

"Sir, this truck is out of gas."

To which I retorted,
" So, what's your point? Like, that's not covered under warranty?"

Ford fooled me once but, never again!
$23,000 for a vehicle and 'I' have to buy the gas!??

 

That's like the guy who called the customer svc. rep at a computer company. They went through the whole list of things that would cause the thing to not turn on, only to find out that their was a blackout in the persons' neighborhood. It was too dark behind the desk to check if it was plugged in. LOL!

 

Well I finally got a chance to post some pictures of the door cracks and the rust.

http://www.nx2k.com/truck/rust_web/index.htm

The 1st page isn't that bad, the majority of the rust is on the second page which is the drivers side door.

 

From my observation around where I live,I came up to this conclusion:Ford,it's bad luck to get a lemon.
GM,you're lucky to get a good one.

 

I have a 99 new body style Silverado with 102k miles. The GM's have their own problems, but mainly just the '99 and early '00s. One is the ABS module goes out randomly, and the other is steering column clunking. Those are the only 2 problems my Silverado has had. Pretty minor problems, luckily there are no common problems with rust or cracking.

I've been considering to sell my Silverado and buy a used 97+ F-150 with the proceeds because I parked next to an F-150 HD and with all its curves and roundedness, it just looked so much prettier than my Chevy. I really have no reason, other than aesthetics, to switch from my trusty Chevy to Ford (although for a superficial guy like me, that's a pretty compelling reason). Your post makes me wonder though, if switching from Silverado to F-150 would be like having a not very physically attractive, but really sweet girl that is very loyal and trustworthy, but breaking up with her in favor of a temperamental b*tch that's hot looking but high maintennance.

What I find kind of strange, is that the rusting at the seams problem was also something I fought with on my '86 Mercury Sable. That car was designed a long, long time ago. My mom also had an '89 Taurus that did the same thing. I currently own '88, 89, and 90 GM cars, and have never seen rusting at the seams (or any rust for that matter). I'm surprised this is one problem Ford hasn't taken care of. Is the body sheetmetal not galvanized?

 

C-racks
H-eads
E-ats
V-alues
R-uns
O-nly
L-ow
E
T's

C-ondition
H-opless
E-ntire
V-echicle
R-uns
O-n
L-eftover
E-ngine
T-echnology

G-arage
M-ans
C-ompanion

All in fun....

 

first: so bad brakes and steering are better then some rust.

second: i just traded my '97 in on an '02, after 5 years in wis. winter and not under coated or rustprofed it had no rust on the doors tailgate or anywhere else. wash and wax now and then was all it got for protection.

 

i understand what you're saying but this isn't even close to a fair comparison. a ranger isn't built for plowing, period. i had a friend who tried it with an s-10 also, didn't even make the year and it was gone. again not made for it.

love your car by the way. like the '97's much better then the new ones.

 

The brakes work great, just no ABS. No ABS is no big deal, I used to drive cars with no ABS and never had a problem.
The steering wasn't actually bad, just makes noises that can be felt in the column. The fix for this was to pump grease into the intermediate shaft which DID fix it. I do believe these problems aren't as bad as rust or cracks in the doors. I don't trade in vehicles every 5-years. I usually keep them for 10+. Little mechanical problems can be fixed easily, rust progresses and grows. Body work is far more expensive than mechanical work and requires much more expensive tools and skill to repair. I could rebuild an engine myself with common Craftsman tools and succeed, but no way I'd be able to weld up and paint a door with stress cracks in it.

I don't know if you're lucky or the original poster is unusually unlucky, but I'll keep your good experience in mind if I decide to jump ship. Some days I feel like I'm perfectly happy with the Silverado. Other days I see a pretty, slick looking F-150 and I feel like trading.

 

gnatgosplat thought the probs you had were much worse then that. my friend had a '99 silverado with tons of trouble.
i don't normally swap out every 5 either but i got discount through work plus went up to v8, auto, super cab.
i totally agree with fixing mech. rather then body. now days even many shops won't fix rust for you, (the '87 blazer i had before the '97 was losing it's gate and most of the rear body pieces) so you almost have to try it yourself.

 

wildchild, thanks for the compliment! i like mine better than the 98 and up camaro's too. i love the LS1 motor, but i like my style front end looks better. just in case you are interested, , its bright red, with dark gray leather interior, t-tops, and its a 6 spd stick. its car #1289 for the year 1997. the outside rear view mirrors and roof bar are all red too, not black like many others i see on the road, i like how it is on mine car now has just a hair over 35k miles and no problems as all yet, i love it! Mike