Subject:  RE: Ford...
Date:  Thu, 9 Jul 1998 13:01:14 -0400

Here's the story......

My horror story is actually about my girlfriends car. It was a 1994
Ford Tempo. It all started when we moved from Buffalo, NY to Raleigh,
NC in 1997. I was driving a 1988 Chevy Cavalier Z24 with 132,000
miles and she had her 1994 Ford Tempo with less than 34,000. We left
the night before, and drove to Summersville, WV, her father was leaving
the next morning with  the moving truck. So we got up the next morning
and started driving. We were on the US19 in WV when all the problems
started, her car had stalled for no reason. US19 was having  heavy
construction, two lane road, no shoulders, and uphill (very steep).

So we sat there for about 15 minutes, and just kept trying to resart
it, nothing. Then when I tried it again, it started, so I told her
to get in my  car and go, and I would follow. So we got it up a little
farther, just out of the construction zone and it died again. At
least this time we could breathe a little easier not holding up traffic.
So again we sat, and waited. So I ran across the street where there
was a bunch of construction workers. One came back over with me and
looked at it....he didn't really know what was wrong.

So again, it started after sometime sitting, and we were on our way.
So we drove it for about 45 minutes before it died again. This time
a West Virginia Trooper stopped and asked us if everything was fine...by
this time  I was getting a feeling that it would start if we just
sat and waited. And that we did, waited about 15 minutes, and it
started again. So we continued  back on our trek to NC, this time
it didn't die for another 4 hours. We were just outside Greensboro,
NC...again just had to wait and it restarted.

We finally made it to Raleigh, NC. Here we took it to a shop, they
said it sounded like the ignition module. So that was replaced, cost:
about $200. So now when we were driving around, we had confidence
that it was actually fixed. Wrong, it died again....same way, sudden
loss of power, nothing you can due but pull over. So people were
saying that it was a clogged fuel filter. So we took it to a different
shop, and they replaced that, and brakes. Totally ripped us off on
the brakes, cost: $198. So after about a week, some people were saying
that it might be a fuel pump. So I started calling around to different
garages asking about price. Most were around $300.00, and there was
no guarantee that this would fix it.

My idea of what to do.....GET RID OF IT! So we started looking at
new cars and such. We ended up trading it in at a dealership in the
area for a lease on a new Nissan. It wasn't what we wanted, but AT
LEAST IT RUNS. And hell, it even has a warrenty for all of its 2
yr lease.

After about 5 months later...my father calls me from Buffalo and
says that there was a big article in the Buffalo News newspaper saying
that Ford knew about the problem the whole time, it was a $5.00 wiring
harness, but the part is hard to get at to replace, so they never
said anything. The reason we never went to the dealership was because
the car was out of warrenty...not by mileage, but by the 3 years.

The funny part of this story was that before we moved, all my friends
were saying that my car was going to die on the way because it had
132,000 miles on it. I was watching my gas mileage the whole trip...my
1988 Chevy averaged about 29 mpg. I ended up selling that car once
I got down here, not because anything was wrong with it, but because
it didin't have air conditioning.

I have also found the newspaper article....I will forward that to
you as well.....it is VERY interesting....very damaging.

-- Brian