I've heard many people say that as well actually and to be fair this particular engine also really hasn't given issues before this....I still don't trust its reputation though

 

Were you? I was responding to ... Striker223. Lol

 

And heck I'm not mad, I just won't ever buy or own a 4 cyl!

 

99% of us know that, certainly Striker does.

 

Funny enough I actually didn't know the car could have the fancy V8 haha! I literally never bothered to check and I've never seen one with the fancy option

 

When they first came out they were all V8s!

 

the mountaineer's last year was 2010 so yours is at least 14 years old. and it has over 120k mi. on it, so one hose bursting is hardly a maintenance catastrophe.

i had a 2006 ford explorer with the v8 until 2014 and it was perfectly reliable. also, most comfortable seats i've had in any vehicle.
your anti [most brands] and stereotyping gets old. i get it, we should all drive 10 year old audis with at least 8 cylinders.

well that was your choice. if it's so bad why did you take it for a customer loaner!?

 

‘But that hose there is a catastrophe. I am pretty sure it’s the main coolant hose.

 

Coolant hoses are maintenance items and should never burst on an owner.

No matter how old the car is, hoses are supposed to be replaced as maintenance items.

 

I paid about 2 hours of me working for the whole car......I think that's a good price? KBB is over 5k in my area so I feel like it was a good trade

I have views like that because I see enough brands and cars plus also have access to the international fix database that gives you failure rates per model of given systems and what the fixes other shops used to solve it. AKA I have huge amounts of data that tell me what breaks and how often, it aligns very well with that I see in person and backs up my opinion on what cars are good vs bad.

I recommend most people stay away from what I drive as it's too much for most people to handle owning and/or just way too expensive, plus I usually pick cars for what they are mechanically not based on brand etc. To me a car is the chassis, engine, trans, suspension, and brakes first....everything else is just extras and nowhere near as important as it's just fluff, screens etc are the lowest priority for me since it's already out of date when you buy it and you can easily drop an ultra high end system into a 1990 if you wanted to.

Your ford is a great example of a good one, mine has the 4.0 V6 and 55 trans.....just look up owner opinion on them lol!

 

Yep, lost over 2 gallons. Never had something like this happen before

 

good deal for sure, but maybe wrong use for it? i'm sure your customers are thrilled to drive a worn out mountaineer.
maybe they should use your jeep instead.

good points.

i do recall that explorer v6 was not a fine engine. which is why i got the v8.

i assume you have experience with chrysler's 'pentastar' v6... i had one in my jeep grand cherokee. not the quietest engine, but pretty smooth and surprisingly responsive. chrysler's had that engine forever, and from what i'm told it's very reliable. your thoughts?

well, not saying you should, but yes infotainments is out of date if you don't buy new cars. i do think apple carplay / android auto help there. love that in my lc500 even with it's outdated touchpad.

getting harder in newer cars though without 'double din' spaces and more complex wiring, etc.

 

Thanks! There is just no reason for me to dump it. Pretty much nothing I could find today will be built better. The V8 purrs and soothes, so does the ride.... so does everything. I used to work 12 hour shifts on my feet and the ride home was just heavenly.

 

Yup, goes back to what I was saying before...its old...can't say "thanks Ford", its a 1.5+ decade old rubber hose...they fail.

My first car was a 1995 Explorer Limited, by and large it was also a very reliable vehicle. We had the transmission rebuilt in it at about 60,000 miles, which was common in that Explorer. Other than that though, we had it in the family until 225,000 miles, and yeah it has its old car failings, alternators, starters, belt pulleys etc but it never left anybody stranded...all the electronics worked, air suspension worked...

I would say in its old age it was as reliable as my 2003 ES300 is in its old age.

 

Yeah the newer cars sometimes require insane lengths to upgrade them, mine would require some WORK to add a full CarPlay etc setup but it wouldn't make any functional difference to me.....even a brand new fresh of the lot car never really makes me care since my phone is always more in date and better UI plus I can move it from car to car easily.



Hey now lol! Be nice to my Jeep, it's done very well these last 10 years haha! Most shops at my tier don't offer loaners at all and the larger shop who do have them usually have BASIC stuff like 10-15 year old domestic smaller cars etc. The majority of my customers are SUPER happy to get an SUV as the expectation is normally no car at all!


Pentastar Is generally good but there are 3 issues that are somewhat consistent and very sensitive to owners care. Running wise it's smooth for class and actually has a nice amount of power output and is relatively flat TQ curve wise, it's not Lexus/Toyota 2GR engine but it's damn better than the ford/gm/nissan NA6s.

The major issues that seem to be a "thing" not related to stupidly or owners are that some have bad head castings leading to coolant internal leaks, this even extends to the versions of this engine in Maserati and other higher end brands. Next one I've seen often now in transverse/wrong direction pointing engines is the leading two manifold bolts rust from unprotected/underprotected metal, they snap and in some cases you need a whole new intake to address it.

Last and IMO the big one/actual issue is that it has a lot of issues with the oiling system.....first issue is pure stupidity, service people and a shocking amount of amateur owners snap the oil filter housing off the oil cooler block from over TQ, second is that it has a variable oil pump system that is controlled electronically but for some reason only Chrysler knows fails "dangerous" to low psi mode, third is the lifters seem to just give up at random. Last one I'm not sure if it's an owner issue or not, all of the ones I've fixed have been first visit/thats why they came to me. Oil pump issue is a known problem and is the issue that disqualifies it for me being able to recommend it, I direct people to the Toyota V6 options instead followed by Honda with the warning that the latter has glass transmissions in many cases.