CarComplaints.com Notes: Most people need a car that shifts gears & coil springs that don't shred tires. The Taurus fails in that respect.
The 2003 Ford Taurus has major issues with the transmission failing. Typically the 2003 Taurus transmission failure costs $2,000 to fix by about 90k-100k miles. Not good.
Adding insult to injury, the 1999-2003 Taurus also has a huge problem with coil springs breaking which can puncture or even shred tires while driving.
The US government spent THREE YEARS (2008-2011) investigating the 2002-2003 Taurus coil springs. Although Taurus/Sable from earlier years were recalled, ultimately the NHTSA did not force a recall. They determined that because there had been no deaths & very few bad crashes & injuries, the broken coil springs defect was no big deal & not a safety defect. Tell that to all the owners who had close calls...
1.9
hardly worth mentioning
Crashes / Fires:
0 / 0
Injuries / Deaths:
0 / 0
Average Mileage:
83,167 miles
About These NHTSA Complaints:
This data is from the NHTSA — the US gov't agency tasked with vehicle safety. Complaints are spread across multiple & redundant categories, & are not organized by problem.
So how do you find out what problems are occurring? For this NHTSA complaint data, the only way is to read through the comments below. Any duplicates or errors? It's not us.
At times the vehicle accelerates by itself albeit I am not touching the gas pedal. While driving the vehicle at 45 mph, I take my foot off of the accelerator and the vehicle maintains the 45 mph speed or increases speed if I am driving down a hill or any downward gradient regardless of the angle of decent. When I try to stop the vehicle using the foot brake it continues to maintain speed and if I put the shift lever in neutral, while trying to stop, the RPM's increase from approximately 1500 rpm's to 3200 rpm's until the vehicle comes to a complete stop, and then, only after approximately five seconds do the RPM's begin to drop to 1000 rpm's. If I am driving the vehicle with cruise control and cancel the cruise control, the vehicle maintains the cruise control speed indefinitely, literally for miles thereafter. I wanted to give this vehicle to my daughter who has multiple sclerosis but it's too dangerous for her to drive with this acceleration problem. Do you have any recommendations for me"?"
Throttle stuck while driving up a hill going into a turn nearly causing an accident. I released the throttle and the engine continued to rev, forcing the use of brakes to gain control. Placed transmission in neutral and engine revved before turning ignition switch to off position. Inspection revealed that the cruise control cable retaining clip broke and prevented the throttle from returning to neutral position.
There is a serious gas leak on my Ford Taurus. The mechanic lifted the vehicle and the gas was just dripping out of the gas tank. I was informed not to drive the car since it is a fire hazard.
Fuel filter retaining clips (white plastic/nylon) are not available. Maintenance schedule requires replacement of fuel filter and instructions require replacement of R-clips/hairpin clips. Ford does not sell proper retaining clip. This can/will result in a dangerous massive fuel leak when the parts separate.
I started constantly smelling gas outside the car then it started smelling in cabin then I located and replaced fuel filter then realized tank appeared to be leaking around seams.
- Broken Arrow, OK, USA
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I was departing from parking lot and the car suddenly had some noise in the hood then lost all the power. After starting engine again, I can shift the gear into D or R, engine works ok but the car won't move at all. Before it happened, the transmission works fine, no delayed engagement, no slips, no jolts, smooth gear-changing...the transmission just stopped with no warning signs at all. The car is regularly and well maintained. No check engine light on when it happened. Later it turned out to be the stripped torque converter splines. It is a very common problem among Ford early 2000's vehicles, the splines are only 0.16" thick by Ford's defect designs, which can be easily stripped.
A D V E R T I S E M E N T S
- Lincoln, NE, USA