Faults:

Irritating sounds from the dashboard and driver door.

De misters sometimes work, sometimes don, t.Clicking noise from front suspension. (Ford service can't find the fault!) Cooler doesn't seem to function anymore. Rear right axle and brake drum were bent, and made a scary sound while driving (i felt like the wheel will fall of!).Due to lack of funds I just changed axle and drum (seems the car was bumped by another car in the rear right wheel).

General Comments:

The car is good so far.

I bought it in very good condition (apart from the minor defects).

Lot of equipment+

Faults:

The rear spoiler rattles, and is loose.

My transmission went out at 97,000 miles. And have had it re-built three times. The same thing wrong, all three times.

General Comments:

This car rides incredibly well at highway speeds.

The seats are comfortable enough for long road trips.

The 1.8 Liter motor has plenty of horsepower to get the vehicle around.

Faults:

When I first got it, it had a pinched wire in the engine because of a previous wreck. Was very hard to find the trouble, but once found it was fixed.

When I first got the car it needed a tensioner pulley which I still have not replaced!

A vacuum hose sprung a leak at 75 thousand miles.

I replaced the spark plug wires at 80 thousand.

Passenger side power seat belt works when it wants to.

Heating system settings are off.

General Comments:

I passed this little car daily until stopping after several months I paid cash for it. It's been the little car of my dreams. It's stable, dependable, cheap, very low maintenance, and for me very comfortable.

Faults:

The front crankshaft seal started to leak around 27,000 miles. Ford replaced the seal once, and it started to leak again after 36,000 miles.

The driver side inner tie rod end started to get play in it at 70,000 miles.

I found one radiator lower support grommet missing after the warranty period, but Ford still replaced it at no charge.

The throwout bearing went out at 148,000 miles, the clutch disk still had plenty of wear left in it.

I have had the timing belt tensioner bearing wear out more often than the Water Pump it is attached to. This caused a major problem around 186,000 miles.

With more age and mileage on the car, the driver seat is not as comfortable as it use to be.

The Right Rear passenger door window handle broke at 167,000 miles.(Windos needed lubricated)

General Comments:

I have found this as well as my previous Escort to be very reliable vehicles. Parts have been easy to come by and very inexpensive.

My son now operates this car and by no means is easy on this 5 speed, 1.9l.

He had 2 minor accidents with the front end, and so far there have been no major problems resulting from these fender benders.

I have found the car to drive very nicely and easily, to be fairly quick until just a few months ago when I have had a power loss, yet it still keeps ticking along. I probably will consider rebuilding or replacing the engine and front trans-axle/drive-train before to long.

The air conditioning has been flawless.

The interior has held up very well over the years.