Comments on: Navistar and Ford Settle Their Differences

By: Facebook User

Facebook User — Sat, 17 Jan 2009 00:37:51 +0000

The 6.4 Stroker not much better. 7 count em 7 radiators and coolers in front of a cramped engine bay. And when your Ford dealer needs to replace the Powerstroke? No problem. They only need to remove the entire cab assembly from the frame to do the job!
In the light and medium duty arena the Cummins and Duramax are far superior.

By: fallout11

fallout11 — Fri, 16 Jan 2009 19:50:23 +0000

The Navistar-sourced 6.0L powerstroke diesel engines were unmitigated garbage, a fitting match for a ‘72 Vega but not much else. Navistar thought they had Ford by the balls with contract legalese, committing them to continued payment and acceptance of substandard manufactured engines for the duration without recourse. Apparently Ford saw things differently and decided that even a breach of contract punitive award was worth it to get out of, as JGH correctly compared, a Firestone-like situation.

By: gimmeamanual

gimmeamanual — Fri, 16 Jan 2009 04:54:28 +0000

NickR

Basically the issue was with warranty charges, though I understand there were other problems too. The Powerstroke had more warranty claims against it than the rest of Ford’s line-up combined, like horribly atrocious numbers. There’s been a ton of fighting over this, up to the point where last year I remeber something about a judge forcing either Navistar to keep shipping or Ford to pay money so that Navistar would ship, as they basically gave them a stop-ship situation and wouldn’t budge. Navistar blames Ford, Ford blames Navistar, they do the hokey pokey…

By: NickR

NickR — Fri, 16 Jan 2009 04:12:58 +0000

What was wrong with the PowerStroke diesels? I don’t follow trucks really so I hadn’t heard of that.

and a strong contender to replace the HMMWV

The HMMWV is being replaced? More news to me.

Did Cummins have problems with their diesels?

By: RobertSD

RobertSD — Fri, 16 Jan 2009 01:37:47 +0000

All I can say is that Ford probably got out of that on the cheap. The contract was signed through 2012, I believe, and Navistar had sued them for $2 billion for breech.

I’m sure the complete destruction of the diesel truck market hasn’t helped either…

It also looks like Ford is slowly extracting itself from the HD market. With a minority stake in Blue Diamond, there’s really just the F-550 left.

By: RedStapler

RedStapler — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 19:09:33 +0000

EGR is hell on engine longevity. They are not the only engine maker that struggled with trying to get their diesels to meet the 2004 emissions standards.

Caterpillar stumbled the transition as with their twin turbo ACERT engines as well. They have gone from being the dominant engine OEM to exiting the market USDM in 6 years.

International is actually doing quite well right now relative to the rest of the heavy truck industry. The military side of the house has been going gangbusters with MRAPs and a strong contender to replace the HMMWV. The new ProStar class 8 tractor is a success and they are gaining market share amongst the big fleets that were all Freightliner for the past decade.

By: ihatetrees

ihatetrees — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 17:16:47 +0000

While I don’t know who’s most at fault here, from what I’ve heard the cost and maintenance schedule for today’s diesels is too much for the average truck buyer.

By: jgh

jgh — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 16:46:04 +0000

There’s a 6.7L in-house design in the works. 2011 is the speculated date… no word on if there will be a time gap between that and the cut-off of 6.4L supply.

The 6.0L and all it’s problems killed the relationship (amongst other political and financial issues). Navistar will part ways with Ford much like Firestone did.

By: Robert Farago

Robert Farago — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 15:15:43 +0000

psarhjinian :

I’ve revoked John’s visa.

By: psarhjinian

psarhjinian — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 15:00:01 +0000

It should be “Vis-à-vis”

It’s hard to say why Navistar is backing away, or if they’re being rebuffed. The debacle with Ford may have done some real harm to their reputation.

By: Mike66Chryslers

Mike66Chryslers — Thu, 15 Jan 2009 14:28:32 +0000

Ah, I read the press release yesterday and wondered whether this would mean the end of Ford Powerstroke diesels, at least for now. I knew they were developing a smaller diesel for their 1/2 ton pickup (as are GM and Dodge for their 1/2 tons), but didn’t know this would also replace the Navistar-sourced Powerstroke in the F250 and F350. Thanks.