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Ford Underhood Fire Recall Finally Gets Remedy, 21 Fires Reported Thus Far

Back in March, the Ford Motor Company opened an investigation into eight underhood fire allegations and one report of a melted battery junction box, affecting the Expedition and Navigator. In six of the eight allegations, the fire had originated from the passenger-side area of the engine compartment. Six of the eight fire allegations occurred while the vehicle was parked and turned off. The other two happened while driving.
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Recall number 22V-346 was filed on May 17th, involving 39,013 vehicles produced for the 2021 model year between December 1st, 2020, and April 30th, 2021. At the date of the filing, the Ford Motor Company was aware of 16 reports of underhood fires, split between 14 rentals and two retail vehicles. The Dearborn-based carmaker is also aware of a potential injury.

Two months since the filing, a remedy has been identified for the mysterious thermal incidents. Already communicated to dealers, the remedy comes in two guises. Certain vehicles will have their engine fan ground wire removed from the battery junction box in favor of an 800-watt cooling fan system. For the remaining vehicles with a 700-watt cooling fan system, the repair is similar, except for the installation of an auxiliary box with a wire jumper.

The required parts are scheduled to be available starting next month. Affected customers have already been notified through FordPass. The underhood fires have ballooned to 21 reports according to the Ford Motor Company’s latest count, with 18 incidents impacting rental vehicles. The second-largest automaker in the United States of America has also expanded the population of vehicles to 66,221 units. Based on further analysis, we’re dealing with full-size SUVs produced between July 27th, 2020, and August 31st, 2021.

Care to guess who is to blame for this mess? The Ford Motor Company believes the cause of these fires “can be traced to a change in manufacturing location by a supplier during the pandemic.” More specifically, the printed circuit boards used in these SUVs are susceptible to a high-current short.
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About the author: Mircea Panait
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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.
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