Leonard to Ford: Fix your trucks or face lawsuit City Commissioner says automaker should pay for blown engines and other vehicle problems
By Nick Budnick
The Portland Tribune, Dec 9, 2008
City Commissioner Randy Leonard says many of the heavy duty Ford pickups used by the water bureau have serious engine problems. He wants Ford to pay for the repairs or face a lawsuit from the city.
In a crop of about 50 heavy duty 2008 Ford pickup trucks purchased starting last year, six engines have blown or had major problems while the rest have been put on a low-biodiesel diet.
The city blames Ford.
“The problem with the Ford pickups is exclusively a problem with the Ford pickups ... and it is not fuel related,” says Leonard, who spearheaded the city’s embrace of biodiesel.
Ford, however, blames the city, noting that the warranty on the trucks – which includes the F250 through F550 models – covers only 5 percent biodiesel while the city uses much higher levels.
“It’s not an engine issue, it’s a fuel issue,” says Wes Sherwood, a Ford spokesperson in Detroit.
In the vehicles Ford has inspected, the damage was caused by the city’s use of high-level blends of biodiesel, he said, adding, “That’s not covered under our warranties.”
Leonard’s Water Bureau uses a 99 percent blend of biodiesel in warm weather, and a 50 percent in winter. Other city bureaus go with 50 percent in summer, 20 percent in winter.
Whatever the cause, there is a cost. At least three engines have blown, and three other engines have needed major work, says city Fleet Services Manager John Hunt. The city has so far spent $60,000 to replace or do major repairs on just the four worst-hit engines.
That does not include the cost of staff time for a new practice of daily oil inspection for the new Ford pickups and a regime of extra-frequent oil changes.
In addition to the new beefed-up maintenance schedule for the Fords, the city has converted one of its pumps to dispense only a fuel blend that is only 5 percent biodiesel. Employees driving the new Fords have been directed to use only that pump.
That approach has solved some, but not all of the problem. But Leonard is not satisfied. He says that Portland and other cities who’ve had similar problems are considering “a class-action suit against Ford if they do not honor the warranty.”
In particular, city officials say that they have heard of similar problems from their counterparts in Olympia and Seattle. Kick them when they’re down
At the heart of the legal dispute is Ford’s emissions system designed in response to new federal clean-diesel regulations adopted in 2007. In particular, it’s the system that Ford uses on the 6.4-liter engines in the city’s just-purchased trucks.
As Sherwood puts it, “There’s new technology in them which makes them more susceptible to issues with higher concentrations of biodiesel.”
Leonard prefers this term: “manufacturer’s defect.”
“The water bureau and other bureaus have new and older model Ford, Chevy, International, Dodge, Jeep and Sterling vehicles, none of which have any problem running on biodiesel,” he says.
The problem is a technical one to explain. Ford’s system, unlike other automakers’ approaches, injects diesel into the combustion chamber of the engine, then uses the heat created there in its exhaust filter to burn away pollutants.
Diesel combusts at lower temperatures than biodiesel does. Because Ford’s onboard engine computer is calibrated for no more than a five-percent biodiesel blend, it thinks the fuel is being burned away when it actually isn’t.
The problem is worst with engines that are idling a lot – which is what city trucks do.
As a result, the biodiesel starts seeping into the engine’s crankcase, and as Hunt puts it, “If you get too much into the crankcase it can either cause a hydrostatic lock up in the combustion chamber or it can cause some polymerization of the oil in the crankcase.”
For the non-mechanically gifted, that means the engine blows.
“There is something going on and no one will give us the straight scoop,” says Tom Dufala, a water bureau manager.
Given the situation with the automakers’ financial dilemmas, he adds, “It’s bad timing obviously; I mean Ford is down and we hate to kick them when they’re down. But we don’t feel this system was fully tested.”
Leonard notes that the engine – which is manufactured by International Harvester – does not have the same problem when used in International Harvester trucks. In other words, he believes the problem lies with Ford’s emission’s system.
He and Dufala also say that even engines that have not been run on biodiesel have been having the same problems. “The water bureau has run these same Ford vehicles on 100 percent petroleum diesel and had the exact same engine problems,” says Leonard.
This, however, is news to Hunt at the city’s fleet services. He says that all the Ford trucks are running on some level of biodiesel.
Ford is working on reprogramming computers used by the city to account for the higher rates of biodiesel, city officials say. Hunt says he is “cautiously optimistic” that the reprogramming will solve the problem.
Ford’s Sherwood, however, says the problems have already been solved thanks to the city implementing “normal and regular maintenance.”
At the root of the dispute is money, says Leonard’s chief of staff, Ty Kovatch.
“Ford has been less than forthcoming” about whether it will honor its warranties, says Kovatch. “You can also probably appreciate that Ford Motor Co. will do anything in its power to avoid absorbing the costs of what appears to be a design flaw with the new generation Ford pickup that is not shared among its competitors.”
nickbudnick@portlandtribune.com
In rebuttal I submit the following:
OEM Warranty Statements and BioDiesel
I'm so disappointed in my City right now. Well, actually Randy Leonard is completely useless at his job, so I'm more disappointed in him and the fact that no one above him has had his butt canned for his screw ups.
) to stick closed. In his view, that was Chrysler's problem even though the vehicle is not supposed to use 100% biodiesel. Since the owners' manual was not real clear (it's since been updated to reflect a max 5% bio mix) the district rep agreed to split the repair with him.
