Took preemptive measures on both of these.

1. Did Herb's washers right after I bought it.

2. Ditching the fogs and installing brake cooling ducts.

7,000 miles. Lots of little initial build quality issues, but other than funky-*** brakes (Brembos waiting to install) and the marbles after the first dealer oil change, I am pretty happy.

It's an American truck. Expecting Lexus build quality is unrealistic, even if it costs $30K.

 

Through it all, i love my lightning also! It makes me proud that I have the first year built that I bought used and now has 70K miles on it from 18K when purchased and I drive it everyday..Mines been driven in the rain, snow and been through some other hard times..Personally I think of mines as a tank..Sure i've had some disappointments with it but they came mainly through modding.
Bad chip program caused it to detonate really bad run rough, Magnaflos 12468 installed with the crimped bent pipes caused my truck to run sluggish b/c of the loss of HP. The clunk which I took to a dealer who actually were aware of the problem and fixed it for good. Fuel pump went bad and was replaced. I've only had a spark plug fly once and that was a week after i bought the truck..Ford replaced all of mines under warranty and after using the TR5s and back to stock haven't had a problem since. I'm having loose body kit problems but to me, what do ya expect after 50Kmiles on a vehicle, the elements will take over on any vehicle, ferrarris, Porshes, Lambos etc if driven daily. My truck doesn't deserve bad criticism for it's bad points b/c I haven't had a lot of the other forementioned problems...I've corrected everything on my truck now to where I won't be tampering with anything else.. I just have two minor, small problems that need tweaking and thats my suspension and this small hesitation I have..Other than that purrrss like a kitten and still turning heads.

Thought about purchasing an 02 but got skeptical thinking it just may be a misfortune and regret I gave mines up...Personally I think they took their time with my truck..Still don't know what # it is.

 

Thanks Bluelightning, I hope all is going well for you. God Speed in your recovery, can't wait to see your 03 I'm sure your counting the days too

Just think how great it would be to have a list of all these problems so when you went to Ford you could say, What do you mean you never heard about it ??? I know 56 people that had their bla bla bla changed, and at least 12 who also had trouble with bla bla bla, and well over 100 bad bla's

Thats all I'm trying to acheive here. I LOVE MY LIGHTNING, SOB ran a 12.8 this week for me while tuned down to a simple Filter, chip-n-pulley. These SVT's are AWESOME, but NONE OF US can deny the fact they have some issues.

 

sorry Rob_02Lightning, didn't mean to jump on you yesterday when I posted. one of those days at work, didn't mean to take it out on you.

later,
chris

 

Is anyone at SVT listening?

 

I'm all for improving quality. And try to do so daily in my "OEM" job.

Only things I can really say that are excessive and out of line on my 02:

1) Oil injection.

Easely preventable from a design & validation stand point. They just missed the ball on this one.

2) Loose ground effects kit.

Come on. How hard is it to put a little skill and thought into screwing a part on and making it tight. What no "pride" in the assemblers work?

3) Trash in the paint. Fortunately mines ALL in the roof. And I use it as a daily driver. So I'll leave it be. But it's still excessive.

4) crooked bed alignment.

Again no pride taken in the assembly process.

5) And lastly the drivers window does a "clunk" when closing w/the fan on high and at high speeds.

Design/validation flaw in ventalation of cab.


So far w/10k miles that's all I can really complain about being out of line or what I percieve as a new truck purchaser / automotive engineer.

WOT

 

Is that what the squeeking is? I've been trying to track it down.

 

I have a 02 true blue lightning and have had no real big problems

so far 6000 miles

1 leaking rear shocks... warr. dealer said because of shipping strapped it down to tight

2 pulling to right....aligned it....warr. same because of shipping

3 Engine Noise after First Oil Change ????? dealer told me couldn't hear it, And when I got there I couldn't either.!!!!!!!!!
I think it was the 50 mile ride up at 100mph that cured it! I was so pissed. But changed to mobil1 5w/30 and motorcraft 820s filter. THAT PROBLEM IS GONE

Other than that its a perfect truck, More than I could ask for

The seats get dirty rather fast though, but I love it!



bob

 

It has been my experience that once you find a great
dealer and service rep, that most EVERYTHING is covered
for the first 12 K with no questions asked. I am very
happy with my truck, but wish that FORD, and SVT would
listen to us "ALL" and fix the minor irritants.

Crazyone, on the other hand, still loves his ride, and
"gets on it" every chance he has. After all, I only beat
him by .006 seconds last time .... <grin>

 

I must credit ford with the results of there crash tests on the Lightning. I only became a Parapalegic out of this one instead of dying. (which I almost did)

 

Holly Sh!!! My deepest regards to you bro. My heart sank when that pic came up. I wish you the best recovery possible.

 

Sorry superfords,

I'll be the first to say I talk too much and sometimes come off wrong, I apoligize for the way I posted this. Now that it got going, I'm actually finding out some good info from this post, THANKS.

Blue Lightning, I've seen that shot before and WOW, that is sad.
Thank God your here with us to talk about it.

wydopnthrtl, You mentioned the paint and the roof, MINE TOO.
is it right in that soft recessed area, mine looks like they put some kind of Black Silicone on it to try and hide it. It drives me nuts knowing it's up there but fortunatly I only see it when washing it. I also had to re-glue my tail gate molding back on, that was sticking up right in the middle under the handle area.

I also got the clunk in the window, scares the hell out of me when it catches me off guard

 

2002 True Blue with just under 10K

Fuel pump - warranty fix
Rear windshield seal - warranty fix
Small "dirt or something" sealed in paint in a couple of places
(i'll live with it cause no one else would ever notice it)

That's it, i'm a happy Lightninger.....

Thanks for the post Rob....How's she running now?

 

JohnFastruk,

Suckers running the best it ever did. I tuned it down by taken my upper pulley off, and to my surprise I ran that 12.8 @ 106.4 MPH.

I still think I'm hearing something in the Motor, but it may be a
normal sound thats been there all along. For the first time since I had it, I'm listening and not cranking the tunes. Time to go back to the music and driving it LIKE I STOLE IT

 

Cracked fog lights
clunk
pulls left
dirt in paint
oil in intake
but still love this truck. someday ill part with it for a few hours to get all this fixed.