Ford fiesta eco boom

Wendyb69

My son who is a student managed to buy a car aged 22, he thought he had done very well buying a trusted Ford, he payed around £5800 for a 2017 plate with a fairly high mileage but ok.
car had a full service history, though he did not notice at the time that the previous owners serviced the car late, one time may have been due to covid, but the other was a year late.
car was good for around 7 months, had a couple of issues with the gearbox, but nothing major. Then 8 months in, the wet belt went, before its replacement time. The car is now fit for scrap, offered £600 for it. It is a manufacturing flaw with all of these cars, apparently they have been recalled in the USA Ford won’t entertain a goodwill gesture due to the lapses in service history.
this leaves my poor son out of pocket by £5000. It’s just so unfair on him. He also last his part time job due to the car failing too.
I even feel the dealership who sold him the car had a duty of care to him, they would have known the situation with these Ford fiestas, it was Vertu.

Ayr_Rage

The Ford EcoBoost engine wet belt issues are legendary and buying a vehicle without a full and on time oil change history is, as you have found out, fraught with danger.

Seeing that a service was over a year late should've been a walk away moment if you had done your research.

After 8 months any issues fall on you or goodwill from Ford, not the dealer, unless you can prove they misled you in any way.

Buying a high mileage 8 year old vehicle is always a risk, especially as there is no such thing as a Trusted Ford these days, more so if an EcoBoost engine is involved.

fatbelly

The issues are well known and all over the internet. If you are buying a Ford 1.0 ecoboost with over 60k miles that has never had a cambelt change then you need to factor into the price that it will need to be done.

There are places that offer the job at a fixed fee, such as

https://palmersgarage.co.uk/2022/05/09/ford-fiesta-focus-cambelt-replacement/

At £1195 but obviously you want to be doing this before the thing goes

daveyjp

When my daughter was looking for a car last year she was offered a 10 year old 90k mile Fiesta Ecoboom for £900.

I asked if the belt had ever been changed and was told no, that's why it's £900!

Wendyb69

yes, hindsight is a wonderful thing. Definitely a learning experience, not to trust either a major manufacturer or an allegedly reputable dealership. My son has learned the hard way, he bought the Ford fiesta as I have one which is a 2018 plate and it’s been fine. He also thought the service history was complete as it was fully stamped, I’m sure the dealership told him it was complete, but can’t be sure. He was only 21 at the time, and I know it’s not an excuse and by rights he should have googled problems with the model, but he was inexperienced and I would go as far to say he was taken advantage of, I feel morally it was so wrong to sell that car to him. I would never buy from vertu or Ford again.

Baldytyke88

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/6660549/ford-fiesta-eco-boom

Vertu have a 4.7 out of 5 rating on Trustpilot, you would think a good dealer would have replaced the wet belt as standard practice. It can be good for young people to learn lessons, take the good from a bad situation.

Mildly_Miffed

I'm just astonished anybody would pay nearly six grand for an 8yo Fiesta.

Factory interval on the belt is 10yrs/150k - but it's VERY widely known that that's overlong, and 6-8yrs, 60-80k is a far safer interval. Your son's car is over that.

But with wet belts, the ABSOLUTE KEY to longevity is proper servicing. Regular oil changes with the correct oil.

The recall on 1.0 Ecoboosts in the US is for the oil pump drive tensioner, not the cambelt.

jimjames

My son has learned the hard way, he bought the Ford fiesta as I have one which is a 2018 plate and it’s been fine

If your car has the same engine then you'd be well advised to take this as a warning and make sure that the belt is done sooner rather than later. Just because yours is ok so far doesn't mean it can't suffer the same problem in future.

QrizB

A hard lesson for your son but I agree with the others that a 7/8 year old car (any* car, not just an Ecoboom) without a recent cambelt change is going to need one PDQ. Preferably before you buy it!

* The exception being cars that don't have cambelts.

photome

https://forums.moneysavingexpert.com/discussion/comment/81930794#Comment_81930794

does your fiesta have the same engine?

There are other engines to stay away from , like the 1.2 puretec used in many different makes all from the stellantis family of cars

Mildly_Miffed

The Puretech is a far better engine than the Ecoboost.

Wet belt failures are almost all associated with lack of servicing, and a belt change is a 2.5hr job - it genuinely begs belief how Ford managed to engineer the EcoBoost to take twelve of more hours for a routine maintenance item, even before the other failures on this engine.