I had to have a valve job on the engine at about 90,000 miles including a new head gasket after I was losing power and overheating.
My overdrive light does flash and has been for three years as other owners of this car describe, but I don't have erratic shifting or any of the transmission problems they describe. So in my case the light has not meant imminent transmission failure. My mechanic said that it is a computer sensor malfunction and should not affect the performance of the car and so far he has been right.
I wanted to post here because my experience with the 626 overdrive light is a bit less severe than others have described it here. I have not had any trouble with the transmission, but rather with the engine.
I have also never experienced any alignment issues as some 626 drivers have described. I get my tires aligned and rotated (or new) every three years, which seems reasonable.
In general I have really enjoyed this car and if the transmission fails at 130,000 miles I would consider that a pretty long life for it, considering my last car, a Ford Taurus experienced transmission failure at 60,000 miles. I will probably never buy a ford associated car again however.
The writer commented:
"In general I have really enjoyed this car and if the transmission fails at 130,000 miles I would consider that a pretty long life for it, considering my last car, a Ford Taurus experienced transmission failure at 60,000 miles. I will probably never buy a ford associated car again however."
I will advise that the 626 is almost the same car as a
Ford Probe.
Note: A Comments RSS Feed is available. New comments appear in the Members Area before the main site