2021 Ford Bronco
This year drew an ordinary 223 complaints for a Ford Bronco — the model's median is 94. What they were about is the unusual part: 10.8% of them mention valve, against 1.8% across the model's other years.
First year of a new generation. The Ford Bronco was redesigned for 2021. A first year carries problems nobody has found yet, and they are found by the people who buy it — which is worth knowing before you become one of them.
NHTSA opened a defect investigation into this model year.
| Complaints filed | 223 |
|---|---|
| Median for this model | 94 |
| Involving a crash | 6 |
| Involving a fire | 3 |
| Recalls | 20 |
| EPA combined | 18 mpg |
What the complaints were about
- valve — 10.8% of this year's complaints, against 1.8% across the model's other years (6.1×). Owners wrote it as: valve, tow truck, new engine, barely.
- engine failure — 10.8% of this year's complaints, against 2.2% across the model's other years (4.8×). Owners wrote it as: engine failure, catastrophic, catastrophic engine, acknowledge.
- restart — 13% of this year's complaints, against 4.2% across the model's other years (3.1×). Owners wrote it as: restart, dropped, busy, dropped valve.
Words owners used for the same problem are counted together, so a fault written four different ways is measured once. Grouped by which complaints they appear in, not by a list anyone wrote in advance.
What owners wrote
Was driving my son to school, maybe 30 mph when all of a sudden I heard some clicking noises from the engine. The power dropped and I was barely able to pull over to the side of the busy road out of harms way. Engine dead. Only warning lights I got were a forw…
2021 FORD BRONCO. CONSUMER WRITES IN REGARDS TO KNOWN DEFECT WITH VALVES THAT CAUSES CATASTROPHIC ENGINE FAILURE. THE CONSUMER STATED THE [VIN] HAD NOT MADE ANY EFFORT TO ACKNOWLEDGE THE FAILURE. THE CONSUMER BELIEVED THE ENGINE SHOULD BE RECALLED AS MANY OTHE…
Verbatim from NHTSA complaint filings, with identifying details removed.
Recalls for this year
- 21V982000 FORWARD COLLISION AVOIDANCE Fixed free of charge.
- 21V770000 AIR BAGS Fixed free of charge.
- 22V411000 LATCHES/LOCKS/LINKAGES Fixed free of charge.
- 22V825000 BACK OVER PREVENTION Fixed free of charge.
- 22V928000 AIR BAGS Fixed free of charge.
- 23V165000 BACK OVER PREVENTION Fixed free of charge.
- 23V358000 SEAT BELTS Fixed free of charge.
- 23V598000 BACK OVER PREVENTION Fixed free of charge.
Showing 8 of 20. The rest are on NHTSA's site.
How this was worked out
Every year of the Ford Bronco was compared against its own history rather than against other cars, which removes popularity and age from the answer — a common car draws more complaints at equal reliability, and an older one has had longer to accumulate them. A year is flagged when it drew at least 2.5× this model's median and at least 50 complaints.
This is a fault record, not a review. Nobody files a federal complaint to say the car was fine, so it shows what tends to go wrong — not whether owners liked it, and not whether it is a good car.
Source: NHTSA complaints, recalls and investigations, retrieved . Look this vehicle up directly on NHTSA's site to check anything here.
Own a 2021 Ford Bronco? What happened to yours?
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