Recalls in December 2004

December 29, 2004
Porsche is recalling the 911 Cabriolet sports car to check the roof mechanism.

Porsche said the recall affects 18,165 of the vehicles built between Aug. 11, 1993, and Jan. 26, 1998. The cars' soft tops could open unexpectedly at high speeds.

The carmaker said it did not know of any accidents or injuries attributed to the problem.

Porsche said it had at first assumed that an error in service was to blame for the fault in a car it was monitoring, as no such problem had shown up in normal quality control. After two further cases were reported in Germany, it established that a tear in the roof-winding drive was to blame.

December 10, 2004
Ford is recalling about 474,000 Escape and Mazda Tribute sport utility vehicles from the 2002-2004 model years. The accelerator cable may prevent the engine from returning to the idle position, which could increase stopping distance and result in a crash.

The vehicles involved in the recall are from the 2002-2004 model years and have 3.0 liter engines.

About 470,000 Escape SUVs are being recalled in the United States, according to the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration. The rest are in Canada and other countries where the models are sold.

No injuries or accidents have been linked to the problem.

Susan of Benld, IL writes (2/24/05):
In your article that was published back in December about the Mazda Tribute recalls on the accelerator cable, it states that no injuries have been associated with this. At the hospital in St Louis where I work, we have 2 patients who were involved in a rollover accident because of the stuck cable. Even though wearing seatbelts, both young girls were ejected, as the vehicle rolled 18 (yes, eighteen) times.

One is now a quadriplegic and the other it appears will be mostly okay after much rehabilitation. The parents received their recall notice in the mail 3-4 days after the tragic accident.

Consequences? Two young lives forever changed and shattered. One, the paraplegic, and secondly the friend who will be okay, knowing she was driving and her friend will never be okay.

December 10, 2004
Under pressure from federal safety regulators, DaimlerChrysler has agreed to recall 600,000 of its popular Dodge Durango SUVs, along with some Dodge Dakota pickup trucks -- due to problems with front-end ball joints.

A spokesman for the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said Thursday it wanted DaimlerChrysler to voluntarily recall the vehicles to address the problem after it received 28 reports of drivers finding themselves in dangerous situations and the spokesman said that if the carmaker declines, the agency might take action to force a recall. ConsumerAffairs.com has received more than 60 reports of ball joint problems in the Durango and related models.

On Friday, DaimlerChrysler agreed to recall 600,000 Durango and Dakota vehicles from the 2000 to 2003 model years but said it didn't consider the defect to be a safety hazard and denied knowing of any injuries. NHTSA also said it knew of no injuries.

Consumer advocates were dismayed by DaimlerChrysler's insistence the problem was not a safety hazard.

"ConsumerAffairs.com has received at least five reports of accidents resulting from ball joint failure. At least one resulted in a minor injury," said ConsumerAffairs.com President James R. Hood. "In one incident, the Durango went out of control and struck an oncoming vehicle. In another, a Durango swerved out of control, hit a light pole and then a concrete abutment."

"It's unbelievable anyone would say with a straight face that a suspension collapse is not a safety hazard," Hood said. "The truth is no one knows how many deaths and injuries have been caused by this defect because the evidence can easily be destroyed in an accident that results from a high-speed suspension failure."

Consumers have long complained to ConsumerAffairs about a number of problems with the Durango, including the safety problem highlighted by the NHTSA.

Earlier this year, J.A. of Dalton Illinois wrote, "While driving my 2000 Dodge Durango, I lost control of my truck and it continued to go left. The steering wheel was straight and the truck was going to the left."

"I was traveling at about 25 mph. My vehicle struck an oncoming car and continued into a gas station where my vehicle struck the concrete barrier around the gas pump. It continued to slide out of the gas station onto a residential street where we finally came to rest in a front yard," he said.