Well, googling it doesn't produce anything other than the video from the early 80s, and a few bits from Ford USA press releases from the same era too.

According to the press releases (and these were USA ones), Ford would cover parts, the dealership labour (or labor) charges. But it had to be in th same dealership.

I'd suggest getting all your old paperwork together and going into the same place you had the work done, and then wait for the laughter to start ...

The word 'petty-minded' comes to me for some reason.

If you think you've got a guarantee, and you've got paperwork to prove it, then tell the dealership to honour it. If they won't, take them to court.

You're talking about work that was done when most dealerships were still on paperwork or floppy discs. If you don't have complete records, then you can be certain nobody from Ford or the dealership will have.

So which part of your Mazda has gone wrong under the terms of the warranty?

Presumably this topic will run it's course quite soon.

A twenty something year old car with an owner keen to pursue a (rather unusually obscure) warranty claim which the manufacturers have investigated and refuted.

Like others, in my ignorance, I wasn't aware of the rather short lived and specific 'Lifetime Warranty' that Ford evidently offered for a while all that time ago.

The OP has demonstrated, in several replies, that he knows more about the affair than anyone here but remains hopeful that someone will appear with evidence to substantiate his claim....good luck with that - I'm afraid I can't help myself...the only "Lifetime Warranty" I was aware of was the one offered by Vauxhall a couple of years ago. That one was withdrawn after a year or two (a bit of a shame as I might have looked more closely at a Vauxhall had it remained in place....but clearly they either lost money and/or decided they didn't have that much confidence in their products to keep it in place).

Certainly an unusual thread but one that I can't see having a lot of mileage...but I'll keep an eye on it to see if it bears fruit.

If you read the text, it's most replacement parts (therefore not all) and only at participating dealers (therefore not all).

Not quite incontrovertible.

You may 'distinctly remember' being told that it was covered for life.

But unless you've got something ON PAPER that says that YOUR repair was covered for life (not some repairs, that someone else may have had done, or that Ford offered a service where some repairs were covered for life), then you haven't got any proof. As such, you haven't got a guarantee / warranty.

Put it this way : Imagine you owned a shop, and someone who you sold something to 15 years ago comes back to you today, claiming that this item was covered 'for life', and that the shop manager 'told them so' at the time, back in 2001. Therefore they'd like a free repair please. No, they haven't got any proof that they've got a warranty for life, just their perfect, infallible memory.

You'd laugh them out of the door. And rightly so.

Can I ask the OP, WD401, if you have a bit of a track record of getting on the wrong side of people? It rather strikes me that there's a distinct tone or edge to the way you come across here. You're coming over as having all the answers - except the one you seek...and which, regrettably, no-one has been able to help you with.

I think we know that it's a Ford you're asking about so you don't need to make condescending remarks such as... "This is not some amateur company selling nick-nacks,this is Ford MotorCompany".

I hope you solve your conundrum but I don't think you're making too many friends in the process.

Holy thread revival Batman

How did it all end ?

Before a judge, who threw the claim out, on the grounds that the Ford dealership

who did the work , were ' Not a Legal Entity'

Holy thread revival Batman

Thread revival or not i think what we should be told is how much did it cost the OP to find out what every poster had previously told him i.e. there was no such warranty on Ford cars only some replacement parts.

Court cases are not free and the Ford Garage will not be paying since they did not loose.