2.7L blown engine failure list . . 68 so far [Updated: December 13, 2022]

[1975U15]

This thread is 148 pages long at the moment. Has @Ford Motor Company responded to it even once? We know they monitor the forums.... please be transparent with your customers.

They’ve replied to issues with driveline and tranny issues with BG6 members interestingly enough. But not 2.7 blow ups that I’m aware of.

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[JohnnyBronco]

I just received a recall notice for my Honda Pilot’s hood latch. This is what honesty and transparency looks like. This is why I have been a loyal Honda customer and trust them. No accidents or injuries reported but they still issue a recall and get the problem fixed for their customers. What will it take for Ford to do the same?

This is far from the first self-opening hood problems that Honda has experienced. I don't know how many specific recalls they have done over th eyears for the same thing but do know they refused warranty coverage on a Civic whose latch attached to the radiator split off top of rad, and hood smackjed into windshield. Warranty was no good because of an aftermarket cold air intake

 

[MeanGreen]

It is still being offered on 2022 models. Isn’t it?

Yes, I was joking...

Or am I???

 

[JPye]

This is far from the first self-opening hood problems that Honda has experienced. I don't know how many specific recalls they have done over th eyears for the same thing but do know they refused warranty coverage on a Civic whose latch attached to the radiator split off top of rad, and hood smackjed into windshield. Warranty was no good because of an aftermarket cold air intake

I think you missed the point.

 

[jon]

Ford DID make an announcement about it! Didn’t you see the Everglades preview news?????

Maybe they should have said it was available for Current Bronco owners with a blown engine ahead of the forgotten reservation owners?

 

[Slosh1]

 

[jmundy41]

This is very imformative and I'm trying to decide on if I should take the chance buying one from a local dealer...It was built in January 2022 and engine sticker has AB on it and built on day 356. I know nobody knows but this makes me feel like I would have a better chance of it not going out on me.

 

[21BL2DR]

ii guess I need to get the date mine was built and see where it falls. 2222 miles and zero issues so far.

 

[jon]

ii guess I need to get the date mine was built and see where it falls. 2222 miles and zero issues so far.

Thanks for posting good news! Keep us updated every time it works

 

[21BL2DR]

engine built 21305 which was November 1st. Bronco built 11/15. I’m not to worried.

 

[jon]

Did he ever post a photo of his engine label?

 

[jddotson68]

2022 with a blend date 12/23/21, shipped 1/6/22, delivered 1/24/22. Currently at 995 miles and no hiccups so far.

 

[mpeugeot]

Made it home to Atlanta with out blowing up. Got 2165 miles. I guess it may sit until spring and see if we can get any word of a fix.

I don't need a car daily and we have two others so not worried about parking the Bronco for a little while.

You should drive it... If she's going to blow, it's not much different than replacing the whole motor. Replacing a head is more invasive than a full motor swap.

 

[mpeugeot]

It's entirely possible that all of the valves in the engine are compromised, but the cylinders exhibiting failures are just naturally running hotter or under more stress than the others, leading to failure in that location before the others that are running cooler or under less stress are able to have a rapid unscheduled disassembly. Take the good valves out of a blown engine and put them in the same position, perhaps they'll fail just as quickly being subjected to more stress. Aircraft engines are known for this, as the rear cylinders in opposed engines are often the hottest running due to being so far away from cooling air, and upper cylinders on radials because they get less oil. Could be that the 2.7 just has a hotter running bank on the driver's side.

It makes sense that the manufacturing process would be lumping batches of valves together without mixing good batches and bad batches, meaning, a run of 600 valves are going to be thrown in a crate and that crate will be used to sequentially build 100 engines, one right after the next, all with the same batch of valves. Better for failure analysis and quality control to be able to track where these things come from. Though, I really have no idea what their manufacturing processes are, it could be that there's a faulty heat treating inductor that's one of 6, so 6 valves go in and are treated simultaneously, with one of them receiving an improper heat treat. The suspect valve is then boxed with the other 5 and the assembly worker dropping valves in holes simply has a pattern they follow, so that valve just happens to make it into cyl 6 because it was the last box left.

Heat cycles are usually what cause engine component failure, you get them hot and then cool them off, they grow and shrink and internal stresses build while grain structure is altered, until something eventually gives. For them to fail without warning and so catastrophically, even during initial startup or warmup as some have had rather than making runs down the drag strip, leads me to believe our valves or valve retainers are experiencing stress fracturing from improper heat treatment (other problems would arise if our engines were the cause of excessive heat stress, like loss of compression, detonation, preignition, overheating, etc.). Stress fracturing comes suddenly and often without indication. Happens occasionally (too often lol) when I quench knives too, unfortunately.

All of this is speculation until someone can inspect a few dead engines and come up with commonality between them, then compare to known good engines. Test the rockwell hardness of the valves or rig them up in a tension load cell and see what kind of numbers they get, that sort of thing. Even then, we'll probably never get to the bottom of it without Ford admitting the entire thing and detailing where it all went wrong in the process.

The heat cycle theory is why I switched from sport mode to normal mode to see if that would induce the failure.

 

[mpeugeot]

Unfortunately there is no magic mileage barrier. Too many different operating conditions to draw statistically meaningfull conclusions. Best advice is to prep a bag if you’re in a cold climate, and mentally plan what to do in a loss of power situation. That means:
1). Don’t panic
2). Shift to neutral
3). Steering at speed is no issue, brakes will work if you keep power on
4). Get on the shoulder in a safe manner (signals, mirrors, etc)
5). Leave enough room for the flatbed to pick it up

sure sucks to have to plan, but it’s better to have one and not need it than make it up on the spot.

I have my Bronco now setup for Flat Tow. I can rescue it with my first year first gen 3.5 ecoboost. LOL.

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