2006 Ford Expedition
Complaints about this year name fail safe far more often than the model's other years — 21% of them, about 54× the usual rate of 0.4%.
NHTSA opened a defect investigation into this model year.
| Complaints filed | 299 |
|---|---|
| Median for this model | 118 |
| Involving a crash | 19 |
| Involving a fire | 6 |
| Recalls | 6 |
| EPA combined | 14 mpg |
What the complaints were about
- safe — 30.4% of this year's complaints, against 5.7% across the model's other years (5.4×). Owners wrote it as: safe, fail, fail safe, engine fail.
- mode — 29.8% of this year's complaints, against 5.5% across the model's other years (5.5×). Owners wrote it as: mode, safe mode, failsafe, failsafe mode.
- restarted — 18.7% of this year's complaints, against 5.1% across the model's other years (3.7×). Owners wrote it as: restarted, indicator, normally, coasted.
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.
Also unusual this year
- mode — 29% of complaints, 14× usual
- safe mode — 20% of complaints, 50× usual
- engine — 49% of complaints, 3× usual
What owners wrote
THE ENGINE FAIL SAFE MODE WARNING LIGHT ILLUMINATED, CAUSING THE VEHICLE TO STALL. THE [VIN] WAS MADE AWARE OF THE FAILURE. THE VEHICLE WAS NOT DIAGNOSED OR REPAIRED. THE CURRENT MILEAGE WAS 46,000 AND THE APPROXIMATE FAILURE MILEAGE WAS 39,000.
THE ENGINE FAIL SAFE MODE WARNING INDICATOR RANDOMLY FLASHED. THE VEHICLE'S SPEED REDUCED AND STALLED SEVERAL TIMES. THE VEHICLE WAS TAKEN TO A [VIN]'S MASTER MECHANIC FOR FURTHER DIAGNOSTIC TESTING. THE VEHICLE WAS NOT REPAIRED. THE [VIN] WAS NOT NOTIFIED. TH…
Verbatim from NHTSA complaint filings, with identifying details removed.
Recalls for this year
- 06E064000 EXTERIOR LIGHTING Fixed free of charge.
- 09E012000 EXTERIOR LIGHTING
- 06E056000 FUEL SYSTEM, GASOLINE Fixed free of charge.
- 05V520000 VISIBILITY
- 06E023000 EXTERIOR LIGHTING Fixed free of charge.
- 05V310000 TIRES
How this was worked out
Every year of the Ford Expedition 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 2006 Ford Expedition? What happened to yours?
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