Angrod

I noticed in the article I read that while Ford was dropping their sedan line, they were going to expand their crossover line. So the Mustang and Focus Active will be the only cars in the sedan segment but there will probably be more models in the crossover segment. Kind of a crappy move in my opinion and IMHO they are going to have issues down the road. I see Ford sedans everywhere around here. Especially the Focus.

This happened to me a while back. You are having a voltage drop issue which is causing everything to lose power for a fraction of a second. Have your battery load tested, it might be dying or have a bad cell. Have the alternator checked as well. You can check on your own without load testing if you want, but the results might not be as conclusive. Check the voltage at the battery and alternator with a voltmeter with the engine running. The battery should be over 12 volts and the alt should produce more than 13 (typically a little over 14). Turn the engine off, then press and hold the RESET button on the dash. While holding it down start the car. Keep holding the RESET button until ENGINEERING TEST MODE shows up on the little data center. Release the RESET button and start pressing it repeatedly until you get the readout for battery voltage. If you pass it just keep pressing it until you come back to it. If the voltage at the display is lower than the voltage at the battery you probably have a bad battery. This was my problem for a while. The battery always checked out but the gauge cluster said it was getting less than 12 volts. Tested the cells on the battery and one of them was bad. Went through a couple alternators trying to fix the issue. The Taurus and Sable became quite sensitive to voltage fluctuations when Ford introduced the CANbus system into these cars in '03-'04.

You have a Gen 4 car. The last year for the Gen 4 was 2007. In 2008 Ford moved to the Gen 5 which was based on the 500 platform. A lot of the parts between Gen 3 (1996-1999) and Gen 4 are interchangeable but the newest you can get will be from '07.

I lol'ed when I saw the plate. Nice ride!

I had the same thing happen to my bull. Turned out the toe was off. Had to get it aligned and new tires. Apparently, once tires wear in a certain pattern they will continue that way regardless of an alignment job.

Got the Fiesta to touch triple digits on Thursday morning. I was late for work, traffic wasn't letting me merge onto I-70 and the Transit van waiting behind me kept creeping ever closer to my bumper. Once I had an opening I let it rip to redline in 1st, 2nd and 3rd, then went to fifth and kept it pinned until I reached 100. I then coasted for a mile until I caught up with traffic in front of me. Never saw the van again and I felt a little better. The car was surprisingly composed for being so small and light. Moral of the story: Don't get in my way when I'm mad and running late. I do dangerous things.

Did my first mod to the Fiesta today. LED license plate bulbs. Looks a lot better compared to the incandescent lights that were in there.

I was stopped, for the first time ever, rather recently. Turns out the officer made a typo when he ran my plate and thought the car might have been stolen. No problem, we were both courteous and the whole thing only took about 5 minutes.

Ooooo nice! Now you can race Brian with his shiny V6 'Stang. Also, is it just me, or does it seem like a lot of us are all getting new cars all at once?

Sounds to me like the torque converter lockup circuit is not working. Probably won't hurt anything other than your fuel mileage. My guess is whatever controls the lockup circuit in the valve body has failed.

It's rather gutless until you start pushing it. Once the turbo wakes up it zips along quite nicely. I wasn't sure I was going to like something so small but it's growing on me. I guess driving the little Suzuki helped get me ready for the transition. Every time I drove the bull in the last year it felt like I was driving a big boat. Now you have to do a drag race between the 2015 V6 and the Foxbody V8.

So I bought a car. Both the Taurus and Suzuki were on the way out. Taurus was leaking tranny fluid from somewhere and had a bad fuel leak. Suzuki had been making a popping noise up front for a while when turning that eventually started happening even when going straight. My guess is cv joint(s) going out. Rather than spend money on the cars that I would never be able to get back I decided it was time to get something newer. Behold my new daily driver/grocery getter, a 2014 Ford Fiesta 2018 Lamborghini Huracan! (Hey! I can dream, can't I?) Not a whole lot of room in the back 2014 Fiesta (CPO), 31000 miles, Ecoboost 3 cylinder, 5 speed manual, power windows/locks, EATC, SYNC, cruise, heated seats (don't really care for this feature), ambient lighting, other stuff I'm forgetting. So yeah, Not exactly what I wanted. I was looking for a Fusion or at smallest a Focus. Only problem is the Fusions kept selling before I could get to them or they had issues and there are almost no manual trans Focii available right now with decent miles. This popped up and I decided to pounce before someone else got to it. Not bad though. It's very comfortable for a small car and the fuel mileage is awesome. My only real complaint is how stiff the suspension is. Every time I hit a bump the rear end gets loose.

Traded the Suzuki on Wednesday. Once I have time to take pics of the new car I will reveal what I got.

Drove it for the final time today to U-Pull-and-Pay Pittsburgh. Discovered a puddle of transmission fluid when I pulled out of the driveway. My guess was the input shaft seal finally started to give out. It drove fine to the salvage yard. I forgot how nice it handled. It will definitely be missed. Final goodbye photo:

I have a stick shift eco-box I'm looking to get rid of here soon. Just as junky as all the models you listed above. I was getting ~38 mpg average in the summer and about 34-35 now in the cold. It's a gutless wonder with only 97 horsepower though. Has its issues; Third gear doesn't work (just grinds non-stop so I skip over it,) I'm fairly certain the differential is bad (lots of grinding noise when coasting,) small oil leak where the timing cover goes over the crankshaft (main seal? It goes from full to add in 3000 miles,) A/C doesn't work, rust is starting in the rockers but isn't bad yet, one busted outside door handle, only one working inside speaker, radio clock illumination is failing, probably some other minor stuff I'm forgetting. I did replace the spark plugs when I got it so now it runs super smooth, also installed a new gas tank in June as the old one rotted really bad. 1999 Suzuki Esteem Wagon, 143,xxx miles. I put ~300 miles on it per week. The only part that has me concerned is the diff. The car still goes just fine but all the noise worries me a little. Maybe the diff bearing? Aftermarket parts are iffy since Suzuki is no longer around in the States (selling cars anyway.) I want to get a proper used car soon instead of another tide-me-over like the Suzi. I would rather sell it to someone that would use it than trade it as there is no market for a dealer to try and sell it which means it goes to the junkyard.