The Ford Motor Company has issued a mammoth safety recall affecting 456,565 examples of the Maverick pickup truck and the mechanically similar Bronco Sport crossover. As it happens, the body and powertrain control modules may fail to detect when the 12-volt battery is running out of juice.
Documents published by the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration reveal that affected vehicles were produced between February 5, 2020 and March 13, 2024 at the Hermosillo assembly plant in Mexico. From the aforementioned total, the Bronco Sport accounts for 402,978 vehicles.
Affected model years range between 2021 and 2024 for the Escape-based crossover and 2022 through 2023 for the unibody trucklet. Speaking of which, production dates for affected Mavericks range from February 3, 2021 through October 28, 2022. Why do the body and powertrain control modules fail to detect when the battery charge is way too low?
The root cause is – no surprises here – an insufficient calibration strategy for detecting sudden battery degradation. Because of poorly written software, Bronco Sport and Maverick owners might experience a stall while coming to a stop at low speed, the loss of 12-volt accessories (including the hazard lights), and the inability to restart the engine after an auto start/stop event.
Rather than Dearborn's favorite son, the NHTSA was first to look into these problems. Following 29 vehicle owner questionnaires that indicated that replacement 12-volt batteries resolved the described concerns, the federal watchdog requested more information from the Ford Motor Company on October 25, 2023.
Photo: Ford
The Critical Concern Review Group started investigating on November 28 last year, with the Low Voltage Power Supply Engineering Team conducting both vehicle- and system-level testing and teardowns of batteries with various physical conditions and states of charge. Lo and behold, the engineers singled out the iffy software in the body control module and powertrain control module.
Ford's engineers also determined that a loss of motive powers can only occur if an auto stop/start event is initiated or if the alternator isn't able to keep up with the electrical load demand. The NHTSA also pressured Ford Motor Company to fix the recall condition by opening a preliminary investigation on January 31, 2024. Prior to filing the recall documentation with the federal agency, the automaker was aware of 917 warranty reports, 54 consumer complaints, and 11 field reports.
The bad news? Ford is also aware of 3 unverified reports of fire, plus 2 property damage claims. Owners will be informed via first-class mail to bring their vehicles in for the remedy, which comprises improved software for the body and powertrain control modules. Mailed notifications will be sent in the period from May 13, 2024 to May 17, 2024.
The Bronco Sport and Maverick are getting mid-cycle refreshes for the 2025 model year, with both of them expected to be unleashed by the end of 2024. In the meantime, prices for the compact-sized crossover and pickup truck start at $29,795 and $23,815, respectively, before the freight charge.
After a 1:43 scale model of a Ferrari 250 GTO sparked Mircea's interest for cars when he was a kid, an early internship at Top Gear sealed his career path. He's most interested in muscle cars and American trucks, but he takes a passing interest in quirky kei cars as well. Full profile
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