Unfortunately it's not the first we've heard of and some others have indicated their service departments have already had to do several others.
There are more threads...
There are definitely a few mentions of this issue out there from folks on this forum. Been trying to see how prevalent this issue actually is with this poll.
Had some cells replaced in ours after dash and Ford Pass alerts. I though the warranty was that us owners can decide where to tow it if we have a choice in Ford dealers under 30 miles. If the closest was over 30 miles, they choose. Not understanding the $1,270 estimate. Can you clarify?Hey all. Strap in and go on a hellish fourth of July roadtrip journey with me in a Silver MachE that I purchased in March which almost, but not quite, made it to 10k miles and was almost, but not quite, able to actually deliver on the promise of all-electric non tesla roadtrips.
Over 4th of July weekend, we decided to take a road trip to Seattle from our home town of Boulder, CO (just north-west of Denver). One way it's about 1350 miles, so we split the drive into 2 days, took advantage of free charging (which most people didn't know was coming) on Electrify America, and made it to Seattle with zero issues. Aside from an odd "not available" outage that EA had, we had no fears at all of not making it to our vacation destination.
We had some weird motion sensor issues on the ferry, where car refused to turn off its motion sensors and the alarm kept going off in the ferry car bay. Other than that, we had a wonderful trip and headed home on the 9th. First leg, we drove through Washington, Oregon, Idaho, and some of Utah, where we stopped for the night for a car charge and a human re-charge at a hotel. By the next day, with 75% battery , we've had 2 uneventful charge sessions: 27% in Spanish Fork and 43% at Green River, and we were well on our way to either last or 2nd to last charge at Grand Junction, CO.
We stopped by to get some lunch before charging, turning the car off and walking into Chipotle. Burrito and tacos in tow, we were ready to head over to the Sams Club EA charger, less than a mile down the road. Ignition is hit, we get the "seatbelt" beep, but car won't go into gear and "Stop safely now" is displayed on the dash, hidden behind "Full accessory power", mind you, but we're busted. Uh-oh.
We figure, its 120F, we just juiced it up a hill from 110 miles away, and the car sat on a hot pavement while my burrito and my partners tacos were masterfully crafted inside, so maybe it needs to sit and think about what its done. We eat our food, return back 20 minutes later, same issue. Dang. Ok, Ford can help us, right? After all we just passed by a dealership, 2 miles up the road. We call up their service department, and Amanda there tells me, they won't be able to see us until the 7th of August. I plead, as nicely as I can, that I am broken down, less than 300 miles from home, is there anything they can do? Amada says maybe, but she makes no promises and says it is unlikely.
Alright, so local dealership is out, next nearest one on our stalled path home is in Rifle, CO. Call them up, they're closed until Monday. Fantastic, we're stranded. Call Ford roadside, tell them that 2 dealerships nearby aren't helpful, ask them what it would cost to tow the car closer to our house? Their answer: $1270 dollars. We still don't know whats wrong with the car, FordPass isn't giving any indicator of an issue (even now, more than a week later vehicle health says all is good), and ODB-II diagnostic dongle isn't pulling any codes. Decision is made to see if a longer wait (it is still 100+ degrees outside) would bring the Pony back to life and save us $1270 + a car rental, and maybe find a more willing tow truck to deliver it to Denver for less than $4 a mile.
Next morning, the car still won't start. So a U-Haul box truck rental later, as the city had 0 rental cars available, we're back on the road and the tow truck will be delivering my car to a dealership in the Denver area by open of business on Monday. With the hotel, uhaul, ubers to get all of this done, and a reasonable tow cost ($700) we're still under that $1270 estimate Ford roadside gave me.
Dealership provided a rental, a sexy EcoSport AWD, which took 5 days to approve & receive. Thank god we have a 2nd car and I work at home, otherwise last week would've been a nightmare.
So what went wrong? It took over a week to diagnose (dealer in town is just as busy), but they're saying bad HV battery module, requires replacement of the entire battery pack. ETA to get the car back? No clue.
TLDR: Stranded on a 3000 mile road trip less than 290 miles from home, Ford isn't very helpful in reimbursing or prioritizing broken down/stranded service appointments. Root cause is faulty HV battery module that requires a full battery swap and timeframe is unknown.
[UPDATE 1]: Dealer got told by ford to only replace one module & cable that apparently broke in the process and how they were able to identify the issue.
I was 300 miles away from home and over a 11k mountain pass in one of the busiest roadways in the state, given all that I didn't want my car to be that far away. In addition, I had real concerns about dealerships in Grand Junction area actually fixing my car correctly. The estimate was to tow it to a Denver-area dealership, they were going off of $4/mile plus whatever. I have a request for reimbursement for my tow bill, we'll see if ford decides to honor it.
