So we had a local dealer service our F-250 two weeks ago that included an oil and filter change. During the service they found that it needed a new torque converter and "transmission pump" thingy. We had not noticed any problems. We also had new shocks put on as the old ones were the original. Total cost: $3578.56. Last Thursday night we headed out to stay at Gulf State Park on the Alabama coast. Slept at a Cracker Barrel that night. Got up early and crossed into Florida when suddenly my truck "chugged". I had just slowed down to cross railroad tracks and started to accelerate again when it happened. My wife noticed that the oil pressure gauge was fluctuating. We never had a warning light come on. I immediately pulled into a church parking lot. I opened the hood and checked the oil level --- EMPTY!!I crawled under the truck and found that oil had sprayed out all over the entire bottom of the truck from the rear of the engine back. It also sprayed all over the back of the TC and the enclosed cargo trailer we haul or scooter in. Everything was soaked in oil.We got it hauled to a local Ford dealer and are awaiting details. Luckily for us we had our scooter with us and we rode it back home, about 376 miles. But of course we canceled our trip and had to give away all the cold/frozen food items we had packed.We already have vacation plans for two weeks in Durango and Yellowstone for late June/early July. Question is: Hope for the best with the 1999 F250, 167,000 miles, or will we be making our trip in something new, gas this time.Del

I hope things improve for you. You mentioned switching to a gasoline fueled vehicle. I know that diesels are supposed to last longer, that is not my question, but I do wonder what is the difference in repair costs in the case of a total engine failure? Is that your motivation for making the switch?

Is the oil leak something that was caused by the work on the transmission? If so, the cost should be covered by the dealer. 167K miles on a diesel engine is not extensive. If it is repairable for a reasonable amount, you could likely get another 100K out of the truck without too much expense.

I have calculated the cost of the original deisel plus all the repairs and extra costs of servicing ... and I do think that buying a gas truck will actually be less expensive up front and to maintain. I know that I will be losing fuel milage and hill climbing strength, but I do not do a lot of that, so no big loss there.I have done all of the required maintance on my 1999 and still have had around $5000 worth of work done on it. If I had gotten the 250,000 miles or so that I read so many other people getting, I probably would stick with deisel, but my 167K is not much more than a gas truck my inlaws have used to pull their RV, and it is also a 1999. They have never had a major item need replacing.However, I am not dead set against a deisel. Just not sure they are the best.

Good luck finding a truck that will work for you or with fixing the current one. It sounds like the repair might not have been that good. There are horror stories I've heard when dealers didn't do very good work.I was set to go gasoline, but I found a truck that I wanted that happened to be diesel, so I bought diesel again. Since I regularly go across the Cascades, it's probably a good call. My diesel barely even shifts to go up the mountains.

Maybe the dealer did not tighten the oil drain plug and it went loose or fell out, or the filter was not threaded on properly??

Not a good start to Summer | Good Sam Community

bens170
Explorer
Jun 03, 2014
delosholly,
Sorry to read about your problem with your Ford truck. We hope everything works out for you.
Ben
Reddog1
Explorer II
Jun 03, 2014
I would not hurry to buy a new truck, unless you know what you want. A very large expense that will be with you for a long time.
delosholly
Explorer
Jun 03, 2014
An addition:

I got a call from the truck supervisor at my local dealership, Woody Anderson Ford. He told me that yesterday after they got my letter, his General Manager had him call World Ford on me behalf. He found out that they still had not touched my truck at that time. I now believe it was his phone call to World Ford that prompted them into action and not the GM at World Ford. He then called back to them this morning to see if they had corrected the problem. After making sure they had, he then called me.

So I would say that Woody Anderson Ford did all they could to help me. The truck supervisor also notified me that he wished I had contacted them sooner. They would have called down there to check for me. After that, he has offered to check my truck over again for free and to do a detail cleaning, also for free. This in spite of the fact that the problem was not caused by their people.

As for the decision about a new truck... it is a hard one to make, just as is the decision whether or not to stick with diesel or go with gas. If I were rich it would be a no brainer (my wife loves the King Ranch interiors of some Ford trucks), but I am not rich, so the decision gets difficult. I am leaning to purchasing a new one, but not sure if time permits before our trip leaving on June 27th.

Del
Reddog1
Explorer II
Jun 03, 2014
Have you ever taken a vehicle to a dealer to have a recall repair done? I have only did this three times, with different dealers and different brand of vehicles. Everytime, they wanted to add 0ver $300 of additional stuff. Each time, I had to argue with them that I only wanted the recall done.
covered_wagon
Explorer
Jun 03, 2014
Jim, you are smart and I appreciate you sharing your knowledge about dealerships.

My truck club calls them 'stealerships'

A worker I hired in my small co. told a story about having dinner with his ex-girlfriends family who were very large dealership owners. He told me that he overheard a conversation that convinced him that Vehicles that are popular and easy sellers on the used car/truck market get the special treatment in the service shop...... motivate the owner to trade in.

This may be true at some places. I've personally only experienced one bad result of incompetence from the service shops I've been to.

However, I have heard of many horror stories with big bills attached to them.
bigfootford
Nomad II
Jun 03, 2014
I feel your pain...

I do not do Dealerships for any repairs after warranty for the very reasons of what happened to you.

When I got my 94 it had 64,000 miles on it and was 12 years old. It is a beautiful truck.

The original owner kept it garaged and was only used to take their 5'er to Cancun a few times.

They had the tranny puke 2 times... Seals... The 2nd time was found to be caused by the Dealership's improper repair.

Dealerships were the only folks that touched this truck...Even out of warranty... The dealership improperly re-assembled the rear brakes so they did not work properly. The E-brake was improperly repaired, the rear axle seals were improperly installed.. The list goes on. Thousands of $ those poor folks poured into the DEALERSHIP's improper repairs.... From one dealer to the other as they traveled...

They kept every receipt on this truck so I could review what went on...

I personally fixed everything and felt really sad for the original owners.. They were in their 70's back then and finally gave up on the whole thing because the repairs were costing them too much money... The dealerships they went to for repairs sucked them dry.

Jim
covered_wagon
Explorer
Jun 03, 2014
I never go to the dealership because they war against the conspiracy of truck owners who continually drive by their service shop/ sales office with 600,000 miles on them.

I say you should always get at least two diagnostics/ opinions before having work done. ALWAYS Sorry for the caps.
Reddog1
Explorer II
Jun 03, 2014
Great that you had a happy ending. $575 to replace a blown o-ring sounds a bit pricy, but a guess it depends on where it is at.

After having this experience, what truck are you going to buy? Has this experience influenced your decision?

Wayne
delosholly
Explorer
Jun 03, 2014
The conclusion to the story?

Well I had to send a 4-page long letter to the General Managers of both Ford dealerships at 1:20pm yesterday threatening contact with Ford Corporation. At 5:00pm I got a phone call from World Ford and they got a mechanic to finally look at my truck. It appears that the problem was not related at all to the work done at my hometown dealership. It was a blown o-ring in a high pressure oil line. Another $575 and we will pick it up this Friday.

The GM at my local dealership did contact me right away after getting my letter, but I never did hear back from the World Ford GM. However, he did get them working on my truck. I just wonder how much longer I would have waited? And to make things clear, I was not mad that work was not done, I was mad because they hadn't even looked at it to determine what was wrong and what had to be done to fix it. And both dealerships really need to teach their service personnel how to do call backs.

Now we have this problem: Hope that our 1999 truck with 166+K on it can survive our planned Yellowstone trip later this month or buy a new truck.

Thanks to all of you who have commented and supported us during this situation. Let's hope that it really is now all over (we are really worried about damage or theft of our rig while it has been unprotected at the dealership).

Take care and have a great camping summer, Del
Farmerjon
Explorer
Jun 03, 2014
what a horrible start to your vacation season. I feel really bad for your breakdown but now to get ignored by World Ford in Pensacola, Florida while they hold your truck is absolutely outrageous. Talk about kicking somebody when they're down.
We should all certainly remember how the dealer in Florida is handling this and share this with others.
I hope this works out for you.

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