I guess they didn't have a dictionary handy when the typed that up!

 

This happened to my 06 Mariner Hybrid today. "Stop safely now" message, loss of power. Had it towed to the Mercury Dealership, and just got off the phone with them. They said this is most likely the problem, but that TSB 09-18-06 does NOT extend the Customer Satisfaction Program 07B48, and that it would not be covered! Any suggestions as to how to handle this? I would hate to think that because this happened 3 weeks too late, I will have to foot the bill for this! Help please! Thanks.

 

Update - the Mercury Dealership has diagnosed this as the problem, and are replacing the service harness. I called Ford's customer satisfaction 800 number to attempt to get them to cover this under the recently expired Customer Satisfaction Program mentioned above. They looked up my VIN, and said my particulat 2006 Mariner Hybrid did NOT show up as one of the affected vehicles, so even if this had happened last month, it would not have been covered. Seems coincidental to me that the exact problem occurs on my vehicle, but is not on their list. So, unless I come up with a plan, I will be out the approx. $400.00 repair bill.

As a related question, I guess there's no way this would be covered under the 8 yr. 100,000 mile hybrid system warranty, right? Grasping at straws here, but this sure feels like a manufacturer's defect!

 

If it's not too late, it is easy to do it yourself.

Photos and directions are posted online here somewhere....

Cost is slight, and labor is easy.... may take a while though....
I can't remember if the battery needs to be lifted or not.
If not, you can for sure DIY.

 

This is the link: http://www.escape-city.com/viewtopic.php?f=24&t=1229 where the instructions exist. The hybrid battery is lifted out of the vehicle. You need to be skilled to work with the voltage present otherwise you might kiss yourself goodbye.

 

Thanks for the helpful suggestions, Bill (and everybody else!) I'm not the type that jumps up and down and yells to get my way, but I believe I am pretty decent at making logical civil arguments. Ford had agreed with the service dealership to cover the work pending my agreement to cover the diagnostic service work. There was some arrangement for them to split the cost, etc, or perhaps that is typical. I believe there was also communication with the sales dealership, so I don't know what other deals might have been made.

I don't remember getting the letter that was posted and it wasn't in our files, though when we were digging, I came up with an old postcard from the sales dealership. Who knows, but that might have been the helpful thing in our case, as the postcard was red on one side with big words stating "RECALL" and the details on the other side. Unlike the letter mentioned, there was no expiration date. My gut tells me they figured out that somebody dropped the ball and that by authorizing the work and/or splitting the cost around, it was only small price to pay for continued customer satisfaction - this after all is the 5th Ford we've owned and we are only in our late 30's. We are very likely to deal with the dealership in the future.

We've got the car back and (Knock on wood) we've been running well for 6 days now. Sorry it's taken a few days to report back! Busy jobs, soccer schedules, etc!

 

Thanks for the updates.

Here's the weird / funny / strange part.

The "recall" was for the center armrest "cubby" space. Seems the original models would not stay closed in a collision, and the contents could go flying and injure someone. This armrest, something most consider minor warranted a "recall". The battery wire retrofit most consider "major" since it could cause the car to stop... but I guess... not injure anyone ( from Ford's point of view ).

So that could be what the "postcard" was for.
FWIW, I never had my armrest modified. I didn't see it as essential, nor worth my time to go to a dealer for.
-John

 

Okay, here we go again.

05 FEH 114,000 miles.

We have never had any problems with this vehicle to this point, but today my wife was driving down the road about 5 minutes from our house and the "Stop safely now" message came up and she had to pull over. She restarted the car and drove it back home, I drove it to work so I could get a feel for what is going on. (I have never posted here, but have read almost every message in the forum)

On the way to work I noticed that the car is idling unusually low, it was hovering around 1000 rpms when my foot was not on the gas (it never gets much below 2000) and of course when it got that low it kicked in the electric drive mode. Another unusual thing is that it cut into electric mode much sooner than usual, I had only been driving the car for about 1 mile when it kicked in. It seems to be struggling to know when to switch gears, sometimes allowing me to get up to 4500 to 5000 rpms before shifting which is highly unusual.

So what do you all think the problem could be?

P.S. I am going to buy relays tommorrow, just to make sure they are not the problem.

 

You almost always begin by "reading codes". If you don't have a code reader such as a scanguage II unit, your local auto parts store may be able to read codes for you at no charge. One can also buy a code reader at a low price. Report back after trying to read your "codes".

 

Yeah, thats the plan first thing tommorrow because I didn't have time today. I went ahead and posted because sometimes codes are misleading and can cause you to look in the wrong direction.

Regardless, I will post codes tommorrow.

EDIT*** More information ***

Okay, I just thought of this, but I'm not sure if its relevant.

We just changed the oil in the FEH yesterday. It initially requires 5w 20, but per the advice of a mechanic friend of mine, and due to the high mileage. We put in 10w 30 oil.

This could not be a source of my problem could it??
I am not familiar with oil weights in hybrid vehicles, but surely that small difference would not cause an issue. right?

*** EDIT CODES***

There are no codes being shown. I don't know exactly why it is not showing any codes, because it definately shut down in the middle of the road.