Who do you think got paid here?

[waste gate]

Ford Motor Company has agreed to settle class-action lawsuits claiming its Explorers are prone to rollovers.


Why would any thinking person do this?
Under the settlement, vehicle owners can apply for $500 vouchers to buy new Explorers or $300 vouchers to buy other Ford or Lincoln Mercury products.


http://www.news10.net/display_story.aspx?storyid=35692

[SUBMAN1]

Crap! GM will give you that for simply owning a past GM car! They call it customer loyalty - Worth $500. Guess we know that we need to buy GM in the future. You don't have to have your tires blow up and you can still get the $500!!!

Great move Ford - that is if you are planning on closing your doors in the near or semi near future.

-S

[Peto]

Yep. But there's a lot of happy lawyers.

[-SWCowboy.]

I'd repeat all of the FORD acronyms but I'm sure everyone's heard them before...

For the hell of it, this driver didn't return on foot, I own a Pontiac and I love it :cool:

[waste gate]

Yep. But there's a lot of happy lawyers.

BINGO!! The lesson is, never, never become part of a class action suit. Go to trial on your own. The victim will always win!!

[Kapitan_Phillips]

I like Lincolns. I'd have one.

[jumpy]

I have to add my thoughts to this:
Ford Explorer is a 4x4.
Four wheel drive vehicles have a higher centre of gravity due to the increased ground clearance and have a higher position of the motor and transmission, ergo they are inherently more unstable than any other vehicle with a lower centre of gravity ...can you see where I'm going with this yet?...
I drive a '97 landrover discovery 300tdi. It's a top heavy 4x4 and not a lotus Elise and I drive it accordingly - they don't like to go around corners too quickly, or sudden changes in direction and despite the latest innovations in abs/traction control or whatever, they don't like emergency braking at motorway speeds in anything other than a dead straight line, and even then it's a bit iffy; if it was a case of running a kid over then I'd go for it, otherwise if it were an animal I wouldn't bother with emergency breaking.
How many incidents of 'rollover' are due to driver error and failure to take into account that high centre of gravity? All of these bling suv's are treated like oversized sports saloons, which they are most certainly not.
On the other hand if these incidents are down to tyres blowing out, then surely the tyre and not the vehicle is at fault?

Newsflash! all vehicles with a high centre of gravity are prone to 'rollover' if not driven with propper care and attention! :hmm:

[Peto]

I have to agree with you Jumpy. But I think the issue in this case was Ford putting bad tires on these vehicles in the 1st place (and they did). Add your scenario and it was a real recipe for disaster.

[d@rk51d3]

If you haven't rolled your 4x4, you're not driving it properly.:up:

[XabbaRus]

Try wrapping the exhaust around the back axle when off roading :)

They tried that over here in the UK. There were all these features on TV that 4x4's were dangerous cos they rolled over, Suzuki in particular were getting hammered. I think watchdog tried to make out they were dangerous per se. No one ever bothered to actually point out that the people driving them were probably idiots driving it like a sports car.

My dad used to have a Discovery II and that wallowed like a whale so you had to be nice, he now has a Discovery III with the magic suspension and that drives and handles like a car.

BTW my dad also used to have a Landrover 90 Tdi 200 and once late for work I put it round a 90 degree bend at 65 mph and came out the other side though they do have harder suspension.