after overheating and having to have my car flatbedded, i found out that the intake manifold had actually melted on the engine. i was also told that there might be significant engine damage withing the valve train. what the hell was ford thinking when they place a plastic intake on top of this engine. plastic+probability of overheating=cracking or in my case, an actual meltdown! I understand that this is an ongoing problem with these engines. is there any ongoing suites as to rectifying costs. since this is a known defect by ford as to this problem, i don't see why the owners should have to absorb the cost to fix this!!

My son used car to try to go to work several days ago, but the car overheated about 5 miles from the house. Had car towed back to the residence and added water to the reservoir. Water would gush out in the vicinity of the plastic intake manifold behind the alternator. Took off the alternator, fan, fan hood, to try to locate the leak. Added water to the reservoir again and water gushed out of a 3-inch crack in the very front of the intake manifold. My advice is to stay away from this model of car using the 4.6L Ford engine. A very costly repair. Apparently there was a limited recall on this part for original Ford/Mercury owners still under Warranty. But I'm the 2nd owner of this car.

My Dad has a 1997 Merc. Grand Marquis with at the time 56,000 miles on it when his intake manifold went. He took it to a local dealer in December 2005 and they fixed it for $1098.14 and told him they would submit this to the class action and/or Ford for a refund on at least part of it. After 4 or 5 months he started to call the dealer to see what was going on and he was always told this would take allot of time. On 6-23-06 (6 months later) I called the dealer to see what was up and they were being shutdown by Ford that day (6-23-06) and they couldn't even get into the database to look this up for me. So off I went to talk to Ford's Customer Service. Spoke to 3 very nice people. Also had to fax the receipt to them 2'ce. I got a call from the 3rd person today (6-28-06) who basically told me it was not covered by the class action because it happened after the 7 years..... The key here was it needed to go bad before May 15th 2004 and had to be sent in before March 15th?? of 2006. Anything that broke after the 7 years was not going to get a refund. so this tells me that Ford does not stand by their products unless the are being forced to..... Along with looking for another class action for this to get involved with I suggested the following to him. Email www.flamingfords. info site (done today), write the news papers out here, call the Attorney General, call the ODI (Feds at Office of Defects Investigation) at 888-327-4236, send an email to the attorneys on the original class action and maybe even call the local TV stations. I hope this helps. Good luck and I'll post here again if I find another class action.

+This car was bought in Florida at a Ford dealership, in 2005. There was no mention of any problems with the cooling system. I brought the car back to Canada and parked it for the winter, not wanting to get salt all over it during winter driving conditions. While changing the oil last month I noticed coolant leaking around the back of the engine. I took it to my mechanic and was informed that this was a common occurance with the 4.6 litre engine. This is due to the intake being made from plastic. He phoned a local Ford dealer and inquired as to whether this problem was still being repaired by Fords recall or warranty program. He was told that because the car is a 1997, the warranty was invalid and Ford would not honour any recall on this vehicle. This car has only 87000 miles on it, and aside from this problem, I really like the car. Although I think it should have drum brakes on the rear wheels. So far I have spent $300 trying to correct this problem. My mechanic says the only real solution is to replace the intake manifold with an aluminum one, at a cost of $1200 installed! It is my opinion that if Ford knowingly produced these vehicles and were aware that this problem could happen or existed, then there should be no time limit on any recall or warranty repair! It is quite obvious that no matter where you live, either in Canada or the U. S. A., all of us car owners are at the mercy of these auto giants! Whatever happened to ""the customer is always right"? Just a footnote. This car was built in Canada and then shipped to the States. When I brought this car back from Florida I was forced to pay an import tax to the Canadian government. Seems like the automakers are not the only ones ripping of the consumer. Greg T.

I kept noticing the coolant filler jug being low all the time, but never saw any leakage on ground or smelled antifreeze or any overheating. Took car to shop for pressure check on cooling system and they found a crack in the intake manifold and the way he explained it to me is.... they made this part out of plastic and a coolant hose runs through that and because of the location you are unable to see any coolant leaking. He also told me there is a pending lawsuit against Ford for this defect. I did get online to find out about this and as of 3/28/2006 and to the best of my understand of it the limit on being able to recover from Ford for this defect is 7 years from the date you purchased your car and must have been turned in to them on or before March 16, 2006....... just my luck if I'm understand it corrrectly......... I have a 1997 and the last day to turn in has passed too. If anyone has any more information on this please let me know using the comment link. I have been told that Ford correctly this problem on their 2002 models..... so if you have a car before 2002 being on the alert for this problem.