I will begin this letter to inform you that I am and was raised owning Fords. I currently own a 1997 Ford Explorer Sport which is the reason for this letter. I bought my Explorer in 1999 and have had problems with it since. I have had it serviced mostly at De Pratu Ford where I purchased it.
I am highly dissapointed and upset because I feel they did not service it the way that they claimed. My Explorer since I have owned it has always had a engine noise/rattle which I have had checked in the past. It was mostly checked by De Pratu and they would say they located it to an idler pulley or something else and change it but it seemed the engine noise or rattle would never go away.
Over the Holidays 2002 I had drove it over 300 miles one way for a family Christmas and New Years. My brother is a mechanic so I had him check to see if he could locate the noise. He located the noise with a stetoscope to be the timing chain. He advised me to have it replaced or in the least checked when we got back home.
So my boyfriend called De Pratu and asked if we could make an appointment to have the timing chain checked.De Pratu replyed that it would be a 65 dollar charge but made the appointment. April 02 we took it in and they checked for the noise that was supposebly coming from the timing chain and they told us the timing chain was fine "no noise". But they found the idler pully was not working correctly so they replaced that and charged us $143.85.
I put exactly 536 miles on the Explorer and the timing chain broke, which blew the whole engine. Now De Pratu claims not responsibility saying that they can't even check the timing chain unless they were to pull the whole engine. They also said that usually the timing chain lasts the life of the vehicle. This means that they didn't even check the timing chain the sole purpose of us taking it in.
I am very upset with the service that I requested but did not recieve and I'm not sure of the action I should take. I am not ignorant enough to expect De Pratu to foot the bill, but I do believe they should except partial responsibility. They made a 700 dollar bill into a 4800 dollar bill to replace the whole engine. (De Pratu's quotes) Please advise me ASAP what to do.
P.S. Have you had problems with your paint? My Explorer is only 6 years old and the paint is cracking mainly on the hood and above the windshield. The paint is chipped away in some places and there is some rust.
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