Re: American vs German Quality

My firsthand experience is that all Chrysler 318 engines last over

200,000 miles and 50% last over 400,000 miles. Does that mean a fleet should have the same experience?

The point is that Modulars, particularly early ones, needed some pretty major component replacements a lot more often than fleet builders were used to seeing.

Cool. Now we're getting somewhere. Do you have any pointers on sources of information that would fill in some of the blanks here? By "early" do you mean 1996/1997/1998/2004?

Cheers,

CV? Chrysler Vehicle?? Something else???

Matt

Not completely. Assembly quality has an effect on reliability as well. It is still not possible to engineer a design such that it is completely idiot-proof with respect to assembly.

Matt

That's Daniel all right, all Fords suck but his 1992 Dodge Omni is the best damn car ever built..... strange Bob

Considering that I am replying from rad...and what does that have to do with my cogent observation? I have been hearing the same juvenile bs since I was a pup.

Harry K

Ford Crown Victoria.

I've never owned an Omni, and that's a model that was discontinued in

1990.

Thanks for playing.

DS

I'd say go look at the TSBs as Daniel suggested. I haven't talked to a fleet guy about it since before 2000 so I have no current point of contact, nor have I really followed the development closely. I DO know that my employer's 1998 fleet van with a 5.4 drives and responds COMPLETELY differently than 2003 and 2005 rentals I've had with the newer 5.4 engine- how much is due to engine management and how much due to hardware improvements I do not know. I've also picked up and thumbed through a book on building high-performance (ie full race) Ford Modulars in the bookstore one day, and it had a whole litany of things in its "spotters guide" about which year blocks make good starting points and which should be avoided. Basically, it pretty much ignores all the iron blocks and focuses on the aluminum blocks from the Mk VIII, Navigator, and Cobra. The iron block is the one that Dan and I are both talking about, and the one that has really corny features like setting bearing cap alignment by jackscrews rather than machined mating surfaces (ditched by Ford in its own hi-po applications). To be honest, I only picked it up out of sheer surprise that ANYONE has had success building full-race Ford Modulars.

And if you want a one-sentence blanket assesment of the Modular compared to the Mopar Hemi and the GM Gen-III, try this:

Most of the article is a detailed assessment of the Hemi using the LS-6 as a benchmark, but concludes that the LS-6 is "streets ahead" of the Ford Modular, and the Hemi is ahead of the LS-6.

Ask me, go ahead, ask me! My reply will be "so what and who really cares about that?"

Hmmmmmmmmm, I thought Ford Crown Victoria was WPC!

Good article...It sounds like they did their homework on the new "hemi."

As far as the Ford 4.6/5.4, while it may not be a good engine to hop up for street rods, it must be reasonably reliable in fairly hard use, or they wouldn't continue to be used by most police departments and taxi companies in the U.S.

Your assumption is faulty. You're forgetting that there is no alternative to the CV for a large RWD sedan in the North American market. When the Caprice went out of production after '96, an industry sprang up based on nothing but refurbishing police Caprices for further service -- several such companies did very well, as many departments found the CV's durability, handling and/or defogger performance unacceptable.

The cops in much of Southeastern Ontario, which is a large market, have been steadily changing over from CVs to Chevrolet Impalas. The cab companies don't buy many CVs any more; they're buying mostly Impalas (though Hyundai Sonatas, of all things, are making inroads). Every time you ask, you get more-or-less the same answer: "Sure, the CV as a whole can last a lot of KMs, but only with a lot of parts replacements; the engines don't last."

I think the ONLY reason its popular with police and taxi companies is because it comes in the Crown Vic, not because its particularly rugged itself. Front-drive cars fall apart in police service, and after the Diplomat went away in 89 and the Caprice in the late 90s, the only remaining rear-drive car suitible for police work was the Crown Vic.

Given that front drive cars would work fine as cop cars, and front drive minivans would work better than Crown Vics as taxis, there is obviously a pro-rear-drive bias among many fleet operators. The fact remains, though, that the 4.6's must not be that terrible, or said fleet operators would "bite the bullet" and start using one of the many front-drive cars and vans that would serve their purposes. If southeastern Ontario dumps salt on roads at anywhere near the rate of nearby places in the U.S., there will be a limited time during which they can use the Caprices which have now been out of production for eight years or so. Maybe they could transplant Chevy or Mopar engines into the Fords if they are that big on rear drive, and if the Ford 4.6's are that bad.

Oops, looks like you're having comprehension troubles. Did you not know that the Impala is a FWD vehicle? Were you maybe thinking of the old RWD Impala discontinued two decades ago? Here, have another go:

The cops in much of Southeastern Ontario, which is a large market, have been steadily changing over from CVs to Chevrolet Impalas. The cab companies don't buy many CVs any more; they're buying mostly Impalas (though Hyundai Sonatas, of all things, are making inroads). Every time you ask, you get more-or-less the same answer: "Sure, the CV as a whole can last a lot of KMs, but only with a lot of parts replacements; the engines don't last."

If the Ford 4.6/5.4 is so bad and "doesn't last," why don't the Consumer Reports surveys show it. If you check the '96 to '03 "engine" listings for the Crown Vic, Grand Marquis, Town Car, Mustang, F150, Navigator, and Expedition which use these engines and compare the results with the Silverado, Tahoe, Suburban, Sierra, and Yukon which use the Chevy V8's, guess what? The Ford engines are more reliable. The Buick Regal, LeSabre and Park Avenue which have used the 3800 V6 engine over the entire '96-'03 model years of the latest CR report had worse results for '96 to '98 than either the Ford or GM V8's. Maybe police departments are buying Impalas with 3800's rather than CV's not because the CV's blow engines, but because the front drive Impalas use less gas and go better in the snow. Just a thought.

Because Condemner Retards magazine is full of shit?

Their surveys are based on what owners report, and there is no reason Ford owners would be more likely to lie "in favor" of their cars than GM owners and vice versa.