Hi My son has just had an accident in his 55 reg ford focus caused by the rear axle snapping and he ended up in a ditch Can anyone tell me if there are any known faults with rear axles on ford focus cars I am not sure of the model all I do know is it is on a 55 plate and he's only had it a couple of months. One of the problems we have is the insurance company are only covering the damage NOT the cause He does have a mechanical warranty on it so not sure if he is covered by that yet as it only happened last Friday evening. This is why I am trying to find out if it is a manufactures problem as the car is not that old and you don't expect the rear axle to snap He wasn't doing any great speed and the AA man said he is lucky he landed in soft mud or else the car would have flipped So quite scary really Look forward to any replies
{55 changed to 2005 as 55 is the reg plate, not the 'year of manufacture' - which is what the fill in box requested}
Edited by Dynamic Dave on 16/11/2008 at 13:19
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Cater,
The Focus does not have a rear axle in the conventional sense of a solid beam.
The rear suspension is independent, so the idea that the axle snapped, is not even a remote possibility.
More likely is that some part of the rear suspension came loose.
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Perhaps he means stub axle?
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Unlikely to be anything to do with the manufacturer;sounds more like damage from an accident or "kerbing" in the past.
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They are vunerable to suspension damage from being reversed into kerbs, I've seen a few bent bits.
Never seen anything that bad that it would fall apart when being driven though.
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It's a very unusual incident for a Focus but very concerning.
If the car was purchased from a Ford dealer the warantee should cover the broken mechnical components, and for this type of incident I'd hope they'd offer goodwill repair. Much depends of what they considered caused the incident to occur.
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It's a very unusual incident for a Focus but very concerning.
Wholly agree with these comments, but woud just like to ask... Was the axle breaking the cause of the accident OR was the accident the cause of the axle breaking, which in my opinion would be the more likely.
I work in a bodyshop and often find cars with accident damage AND broken suspension, and not once have i ever heard a customer say that the suspension broke first and caused the accident.
This is not to say that this never happened in this particular case, but IF something failed which caused this accident then i would suggest FORD should be notified as if there was a component failure then it COULD affect other cars with the same part.
Hope this helps
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Unlikely to have been caused by the "accident"-OP did say "slow speed-soft ground".I still think damage was caused earlier in the car's life.
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Broken spring possible.. but would it cause a crash? Unlikely.
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Unlikely to have been caused by the "accident"-OP did say "slow speed-soft ground".I still think damage was caused earlier in the car's life.
The op stated it landed in soft ground.. that's not to say that it did'nt hit a 6 inch kerb on the way over.
The op only states what the son has told him, which could be quite different to the accident circumstances, if you know what i mean..( accept my apologies if this is not the case).
I just find it hard to believe that you are driving along and there is such a catastrophic rear suspension failure that would cause an accident.. In my opinion the accident would be the cause of the suspension breakage.
As i posted earlier, if the op (or his son) is adamant that the suspension failed first and caused the accident, then my first port of call would be FORD and demand that THEY send someone to inspect the broken suspension. If your wife/daughter owned a similar car would you be happy for them to drive about with a part that may fail and cause an accident, possibly a lot more serious than the op's son's.
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