Ford Windstar: How Many Miles Did Yours Last?

[KC]

I am looking to get an idea of how many miles I can expect to get out
of a Windstar before it becomes a money pit. If you own or have owned
one of these vans, please chime in with your experience.

I don't expect a free ride with our eight year old Windstar, but am
concerned that maybe this might be the start of being nickel and dimed
to death. That's why I"m wondering how the vehicle has performed for
others. My Windstar has had regular maintenance: oil changes,
transmission fluid changes, etc. Up until recently it was a pretty
reliable vehicle. But in the last 3 or 4 months, it's been having
multiple problems as outlined below. .

1998 Ford Windstar, 3.8L engine with 145,000 miles - many of those were
highway miles. An oxygen sensor was replaced in December per a scan
tool reading, but the SES (service engine soon) light still comes on
occasionally. The ABS light is on, but that may be due to something
that happened when the brakes were serviced. Last week the transmission
started to slip a bit when accelarating from a stop. Last fall it was
also slowly loosing coolant. Never saw any on the ground, never smelled
it, and the mechanic pressure tested the system and never found a leak.
Nevertheless, the coolant level would drop. Three months ago the
mechanic added some sealer to the cooling system, and since then the
coolant level has held steady.

[Kruse]

KC wrote:
> I am looking to get an idea of how many miles I can expect to get out
> of a Windstar before it becomes a money pit. If you own or have owned
> one of these vans, please chime in with your experience.

I don't own one, (a few Aerostars, not a Winstar) but I've worked on a
few. Does
that count? First off, the trannys do not hold up unless you
religiously change the
transmission fluid. Remember that you are actually driving a Taurus.
The 3.8 also has
a bad reputation although a lot of the problems were fixed by the time
yours was
built.
Owning one of these seems to be like buying a lottery ticket. Sometimes
you will
do okay. On the bright side, I did see one come in a dealership that
had 250K+
miles on the original set of spark plugs. And the check engine light
came on not because of
the plugs but because of a vacuum hose had fallen off. Go figure.

[ba...@psyber.com]

Kruse <kr...@kansas.net> wrote:

I owned a 2001 Windstar. That thing depreciated like a rock and at 40,000
miles, started burping transmission fluid. I googled it and found that
failing transmissions on it were a class problem that Ford refused to
admit. Cost about 3K to fix it according to my googling.

I got rid of it and will never buy another.

b.

[KC]

Found out the transmission needs to be overhauled for $1700. Wonder how
many miles of life that will add?

[Sab]

I have a 1999 lx windstar and still drive it with 160 k on it. It was my company car before I bought it from them and 2 of my kids used it as their college car. I am retired now and use it everyday. The room inside when the seats are out really comes in handy. Other than our ford dealer has at times found some parts aren’t made anymore they still find one to replace it. I’ll drive it until the trans or engine goes which they have not yet

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