NHTSA Complaint #10133402 — 2000 FORD EXPEDITION

FORD HAS RECOGNIZED A LOSS-OF-POWER PROBLEM WITH ITS EXPEDITION AND F-150 MODELS IN THE 2000-02 MODEL YEARS WITH THE 5.4 L. ENGINE. SIMPLY PUT, IN AMBIENT TEMPERATURES OVER 100 DEGREES F, THE ENGINE COMPUTER WILL ALTER TIMING (IN A MISGUIDED ATTEMPT TO REDUCE ENGINE TEMPERATURE) WHICH RADICALLY REDUCES ENGINE POWER. FORD HAS A PURPORTED "FIX" UNDER ITS TECH BULLETIN NO. 02-12-3, DATED 06/24/02, AUTHORIZING REPROGRAMMING OF THE COMPUTER AND INSTALLATION OF SOME BODY PLUGS. PROBLEM IS THAT THE PROBLEM REMAINS AFTER THE TECH BULLETIN WORK IS PERFORMED. ON MY 2000 EXPEDITION, I CONTINUE TO EXPERIENCE POWER LOSS OF ROUGHLY 30% IN STOP/GO DRIVING AND THE HOT SUMMER TEMPERATURES IN THE PHOENIX AREA. THIS POSES AN EXTREME RISK IN CITY TRAFFIC, SUCH AS WHEN YOU ATTEMPT TO CLEAR AN INTERSECTION OR AVOID AN ACCIDENT. I'VE HAD SEVERAL CLOSE CALLS THIS SUMMER, "POST-FIX", WHEN TEMPERATURES HOVER AROUND 100 DEGREES--I HIT THE GAS, AND BARELY MOVE. *NM