2013 Taurus Water Pump Failure

[Medicalprsn9]

I have a 2013 Ford Taurus with the oh so WONDERFUL 3.5. It has 145,000 miles on it. On Saturday I noticed that there was a dime size amount of coolant on the ground underneath it. Immediately knew the water pump had to be the culprit. After some investigating I could not locate where the coolant was coming from. There was no coolant obviously coming out of the weep hole behind the alternator. On Sunday I noticed more coolant underneath it so I went back to investigating. Low and behold I could see with out any doubt that coolant was coming out of the weep hole. Called the local Ford Dealership Saturday just to get an idea of how much it was going to cost to replace it and was told not to drive it(obviously) and to have it towed to their service department. They also informed me that it was going to cost $1850 plus tax. . I just purchased the car in November and remembered not wanting to pay for the Service Agreement. I called up the Dealership where I purchased the car, was told that I was 2,000 miles past the 24 month/24,000 service agreement but that they would cover it. Thank goodness or I would of been out over $2000. 3 days to repair since they say the engine has to come out in order to replace the water pump. Should be done Wednesday or Thursday.

[Webmaster]

Consider yourself lucky it didn't wipe out the entire engine, some folks have had to pay $7,000 for a new engine. This is a horrible design from Ford. It's not a super common failure but when it fails it's expensive and can be catastrophic for the engine. In the old days a water pump failure would be under a $100 repair job if you DIY or like $300 at a shop.

[Medicalprsn9]

I have read some of the horror stories, where it fails without any notice and completely takes out the engine with it due the oil and coolant mixing. I’m thankful I had some kind of notice and that that didn’t happen to mine.

[mymangochutney]

I have a 2013 Ford Taurus with the oh so WONDERFUL 3.5. It has 145,000 miles on it. On Saturday I noticed that there was a dime size amount of coolant on the ground underneath it. Immediately knew the water pump had to be the culprit. After some investigating I could not locate where the coolant was coming from. There was no coolant obviously coming out of the weep hole behind the alternator. On Sunday I noticed more coolant underneath it so I went back to investigating. Low and behold I could see with out any doubt that coolant was coming out of the weep hole. Called the local Ford Dealership Saturday just to get an idea of how much it was going to cost to replace it and was told not to drive it(obviously) and to have it towed to their service department. They also informed me that it was going to cost $1850 plus tax. . I just purchased the car in November and remembered not wanting to pay for the Service Agreement. I called up the Dealership where I purchased the car, was told that I was 2,000 miles past the 24 month/24,000 service agreement but that they would cover it. Thank goodness or I would of been out over $2000. 3 days to repair since they say the engine has to come out in order to replace the water pump. Should be done Wednesday or Thursday.

I was less than 100 miles outside the warranty (but still had years left) and was told to PFO by ford, and the dealer. Although the dealer was a lot nicer than ford corp.

[Medicalprsn9]

I’m sorry to hear that. I must of just gotten lucky. As of today I haven’t heard anything. Hopefully they call tomorrow to say that it’s done.

[Deckard_Cain]

Consider yourself lucky it didn't wipe out the entire engine, some folks have had to pay $7,000 for a new engine. This is a horrible design from Ford. It's not a super common failure but when it fails it's expensive and can be catastrophic for the engine. In the old days a water pump failure would be under a $100 repair job if you DIY or like $300 at a shop.

Indeed... they should have retained the external water pump style of the 3.0 Duratec. That's an easy pump to service!

I had heard that the newer models, somewhere around 2014 ish or so had gone to double roller chains and beefed up shafts on the water pumps, and were not as prone to such failures... I wonder if a retrofit for older models is possible.

[mymangochutney]

Indeed... they should have retained the external water pump style of the 3.0 Duratec. That's an easy pump to service!

I had heard that the newer models, somewhere around 2014 ish or so had gone to double roller chains and beefed up shafts on the water pumps, and were not as prone to such failures... I wonder if a retrofit for older models is possible.

The 2014+ ones still fail (I've seen many cars) just that now you have 2 gaskets so 2 things to fail instead of 1

[Deckard_Cain]

The 2014+ ones still fail (I've seen many cars) just that now you have 2 gaskets so 2 things to fail instead of 1

That's unfortunate... Ford should have redesigned that water pump as soon as they knew it was an issue

[Webmaster]

That's unfortunate... Ford should have redesigned that water pump as soon as they knew it was an issue

And Ford should have put more threads for the spark plug in the 97-03 F150 V8 heads. They knew about that problem for years but didn't fix it until about 2003 I think. Then came the brutal 5.4L 3V engines in 04-08, those had many design flaws.

[Deckard_Cain]

That's unfortunate... Ford should have redesigned that water pump as soon as they knew it was an issue

And Ford should have put more threads for the spark plug in the 97-03 F150 V8 heads. They knew about that problem for years but didn't fix it until about 2003 I think. Then came the brutal 5.4L 3V engines in 04-08, those had many design flaws.

You're absolutely right... I can only imagine the rationale for not making rolling production corrections had and has to do with cost. A cost analysis of changing the design mid-production vs cost to repair under special service coverage or warranty. They figure by the time it fails, it'll be long since out of factory warranty and no longer their problem to fix.

Sadly that has a huge negative impact on the overall perspective of Ford and the reliability of their products, which by and large is fairly good.

[mymangochutney]

The 2014+ ones still fail (I've seen many cars) just that now you have 2 gaskets so 2 things to fail instead of 1

That's unfortunate... Ford should have redesigned that water pump as soon as they knew it was an issue

The way all car manufacturing works is stuff is built DOWN to a certain level. Oh this part lasts 300k miles? That means it's overbuilt let's lower the quality till it gets to 150k miles and cut off like 20% of the cost.

Just to give you some insight on how stuff is designed

[Medicalprsn9]

My car is still being repaired. They just started on it yesterday. Expected to be done by the end of next week. It seems crazy that the Ford Dealership has had my car for almost 2 weeks and won’t provide a loaner. If they wouldn’t have started it, I definitely would have researched to find another Ford Dealership to complete the repair.

[terbob3]

Is it a CPO car or are you paying on your dime? Mine went at 86k, it's a CPO and I had a loaner for 3 1/2 weeks. I had them also install new timing chain and related parts as well as new plugs. They did this for the cost of parts only since they already had it disassembled. My thought was let them take their time to do it carefully and correctly since I plan to drive it until the wheels fall off, or at least another 85k+ miles.

[Medicalprsn9]

I was lucky and had a Service Contract that is covering it minus a $100 deductible. It is still currently in the shop being repaired. They hope to have it done today or tomorrow.