ford wet belt engines??

[johnakay]

my neighbour's low mileage car broken down with cracked engine amongst other things wet belt disintegrated.
the engine is caput. my concern is that my car has the same engine(Eco boost, EcoSport 1 ltr engine.)
titanium, petrol 2017
no trouble so far it has done just over 26.000 miles, we average 6 to 7,00 miles a year maybe even less now that I've retired.
gets service every year on MOT day.
has any one else had problems?
I've had the car coming up 2 years this August and thinking of selling it next year.
which I normally do every 3 to 4 years.
I paid 10 grand for it not sure what it is worth now but eBay prices are a lot higher than I expected.
picture shown is when I bought it.

 

[charlysays]

I follow the "ford eco boost nightmare" group on Facebook. It's a truly shocking situation with ecoboost or "ecoboom" engines failing without warning or provocation for a variety of issues including wet belt problems despite them being maintained to the letter. The posts about failures are often multiple times per day. Lots of failures happen at low mileages and only 5 years into the 10 year wet belt service life.
Ford often don't sort it even when it's clearly the design at fault.
My advice is get shot of it ASAP. Used car prices are decent and yours could possibly go boom inside of 2 years.
Even if the wet belt doesn't get it this engine has other fatal flaws.

 

[JOEPRO]

Not heard of this before but I figured it was emmisons related which it is

What I gathered is that this timing belt in oil is not in the interest of the end consumer, these are for the benefit of the manufacturer who has to meet certain emission and fuel efficiency norms on the whole across their product portfolio. So they look for avenues to extract the tiniest of efficiency gains from wherever they can and reliability be damned. The belt in oil has 30% less frictional losses than a timing chain system for a net 1% fuel efficiency gain

It's like going from duplex timing chains which do not break, back to single row timing chains which auto manfacturers have done. All for efficiency. But Jags etc breaking the single row chains at 30k odd miles upwards for example means automotive companies are "advancing" backwards if you ask me.

 

[Wozzaaah]

A lot of wet belt failures seem to be due to the use of certain engine flushes.

 

[Ubique]

Ecoboost belt failure is a direct result of using oil additives, there is an old Ford TSB highlighting the issue with a reminder that no fuel or oil additives are sanctioned for use in any Ford vehicle without direct instruction from Technical or the WPaP manual. The ecoboost engine was designed as a consumable item (rightly or wrongly) and was cheap to produce, therefire it should have been cheap to replace. Unfortunately some poor design decisions around some of the ancillary components (turbo degas pipe etc.) forced Ford to make spares available for warranty repairs and re-engineer some of the engine to increase longevity, their obviously increase build cost and therefore replacement cost, so owners are hamstrung between what should have been and how things ended up.
IMO, even the later variants are not candidates for attempted repairs, the core quality isn't worth the time and expense.

 

[zzr1200]

The firm I worked for had Transit vans that the belts started to break up and jammed the oil pressure relief valve partly open causing the oil light to be on at idle. We also had another long term contract hire van that siezed an engine with just over 42,000 miles and Fords wouldn't warrantry it, because of the belt problem...the customer had to buy a new complete engine......Ford Transits are now over priced rubbish...

 

[Chippie]

’er-indoors‘ bought a new Fiesta in 2013….Had the choice of either the ‘new’ 3 cylinder eco boost engine or the existing 4 cylinder 1.25 Zetec job….

In light of all the bad press the ecoboost engine has had, looks like we made a good choice…although it’s ten yrs old this September it’s only covered 19000 miles, serviced every year..Sadly had to change the cam belt on it last year..

 

[brightspark]

my mates went on his transit conect and trashed it bought another second hand engine and it did the same he fitted an older one with chain drive and no problems you can aparently get a chain conversion for them so would be well worthwhile if your keeping it . both of his had only done about 50.000 miles

 

[Nick67GT]

Guys - I’m seriously worried now.

Mrs. GT has a 2014 1.0 EcoBoost with 29k on it. She’s had it from new and it’s been maintained at the same Ford dealership from new (if indeed that actually counts for much…)

Should I get rid whilst the going is good?

 

[johnakay]

do Nissan Qashqai have wet belts.
my said neighbour bought one and claimed it doesn't have wet belt?

​

 

[johnakay]

Guys - I’m seriously worried now.

Mrs. GT has a 2014 1.0 EcoBoost with 29k on it. She’s had it from new and it’s been maintained at the same Ford dealership from new (if indeed that actually counts for much…)

Should I get rid whilst the going is good?

no because it was maintained by ford dealership.
most problems from what I understand is owners/ none ford garages put cheap filters and oil inc owners.
mine has done 26,000 but will be changing oil/filter soon as recommended by ford

 

[brightspark]

hire firms just convert them as its a bit costly if half your fleet go down here is the kit https://www.lymmengineparts.co.uk/lower-wet-belt-to-chain-conversion-kit-for-ford-1-8-tdci-1562244

 

[frank horton]

Honda stopped using wet belts on it's industrial engine years ago.....never seen one fail tho....

 

[m_c]

As long as the engines are serviced with the correct oil, and when they are supposed to be, then failure isn't that big a concern.
Most issues are down to incorrect oils, additives being used that shouldn't be, or oil that isn't changed when it should be.

On the 2.0l, out of all the failures I've seen, there has only been a single one I've seen fail that had been serviced correctly, but the failure was the result of another problem that caused a cam lobe to spin and strip the teeth clean of the belt.

The issue is, if you've bought the vehicle second hand, then unless you have a proven full dealer service history, you have no idea if the engine has been serviced correctly.

 

[premmington]

As long as the engines are serviced with the correct oil, and when they are supposed to be, then failure isn't that big a concern.
Most issues are down to incorrect oils, additives being used that shouldn't be, or oil that isn't changed when it should be.

On the 2.0l, out of all the failures I've seen, there has only been a single one I've seen fail that had been serviced correctly, but the failure was the result of another problem that caused a cam lobe to spin and strip the teeth clean of the belt.

The issue is, if you've bought the vehicle second hand, then unless you have a proven full dealer service history, you have no idea if the engine has been serviced correctly.

We have done a few here - high mileage Transits (engine swaps) and low mileage Fiesta and Focus Ecobooms (rebuilds).

But to be honest - I done more VW wet belt oil pump drives than failed Ecoboost engines.

I seen belt particles come out the oil on Transit Taxi buses - but dumb owners ignore the advice given at the time.

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I am not a fan of wet belts or single row camchains. But you gotta go a long way to find a newish engine that has not got one now.

I not keen at all on the 1.0 Ecoboost engine format - I dred doing a Turbo on one. It books at 3hrs ish - and I can't do one in three hours. Coolant pipes fail wholesale. Along with load of poorly made and designed things.

@johnakay - sell it while it is still running!

 

[sako243]

I'll stick to my wet gears

Mind you it is half the weight of some of these cars...

 

[Bobupndown]

The ecoboost engine was designed as a consumable item (rightly or wrongly) and was cheap to produce, therefire it should have been cheap to replace.

Have you ever heard anything so ridiculous? It a car ffs not a cheap Chinese 2 stroke strimmer. Did it say in the brochures when new that it comes with a disposable engine that should be replaced every xxx thousand miles?

 

[dobbslc]

do Nissan Qashqai have wet belts.
my said neighbour bought one and claimed it doesn't have wet belt?

​

I don't know but they do have Renault engines...
I think the 1.5 diesel is meant to be bad.

 

[brightspark]

Have you ever heard anything so ridiculous? It a car ffs not a cheap Chinese 2 stroke strimmer. Did it say in the brochures when new that it comes with a disposable engine that should be replaced every xxx thousand miles?

and getting the identical engine is pretty hard that has to match up with the

Honda stopped using wet belts on it's industrial engine years ago.....never seen one fail tho....

probably not many left still running

 

[Trevorleach]

Have you ever heard anything so ridiculous? It a car ffs not a cheap Chinese 2 stroke strimmer. Did it say in the brochures when new that it comes with a disposable engine that should be replaced every xxx thousand miles?

Sure I read some time back that the engine costs Ford something like 300 quid complete?