Ecoboomed - where do I start?

[Interceptor]

@phx23 Sorry to hear that man, What spark plugs and oil have you been running?

@Interceptor That's a load of crap. Using the cheapest parts you can buy, rushing production, not testing properly and cost cutting leads to parts breaking prematurely. These engines are failing more than average that is pretty clear by now.

FORD does use the cheapest parts available, I'm sure they try their best to get new products on line before they become outdated by competition. I'm sure they cut corners and cost when available and assume risk. They sale cars all over the world.
When you buy a FORD you are knowing you are buying at the bottom half of well built automobiles in the world.

The world was falling apart in 2003 when people!e purchased the new SVT Cobra. Same talk, ho its got a tick, pistons scuffing, number 3 cylinder is not being cooled...
Then theirs the V6 Dodge cylinder heads, Porsche Boxsters eating motors cause of bearing... I could go on and on but like I posted earlier
Moving parts wear out
Moving parts break
Nothing is perfect

I not downsizing OPs pain and lost, don't want bad to come to them you are me. Just stating the facts here, its a frigin engine with moving parts

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[1320INC]

If you remove all the ECU tuned/mod failures from the list I don't think these engines are failing at an abnormally high rate. The 2.3 is.used in several cars and SUVs and there are no reports of problems.with the engine. Many of the problems with the 2.3 are a result of ECU tuning and other mods IMO.

Some engines will fail, that is just a fact of life but when there is a defect it is pretty obvious. For instance, the new 5.0 is an engine with problems. Just visit the issue, and repairs section and you will find a lot of 5.0 engine problems.

What problems does the 2.3 have when leftl stock, unmodified, non ecu tuned? I just don't see any evidence that the 2.3 has any defect or high failure rates until ECU tuned or modified.

Ok ill bite. 100% stock longblock,stock tune 61k destroyed #3 piston due to ?? The PCV system is inadequate, this causes the intake valves to have oil caked onto them...i can provide pics from said motor. Ford expects people to run these on 93 or 91 when in fact 87 or 89 is more prevalent. This is another Ford high performance motor that has maintenance and servicing expectations that most cannot meet. Add it to the 6.0,6.4 6.7 diesels among others. I can tell you if i spent 15-20k or more on a car, i should be able to beat the snot out of it as long as i did my maintenance and have zero problems.

 

[solodogg]

Ok ill bite. 100% stock longblock,stock tune 61k destroyed #3 piston due to ?? The PCV system is inadequate, this causes the intake valves to have oil caked onto them...i can provide pics from said motor. Ford expects people to run these on 93 or 91 when in fact 87 or 89 is more prevalent. This is another Ford high performance motor that has maintenance and servicing expectations that most cannot meet. Add it to the 6.0,6.4 6.7 diesels among others. I can tell you if i spent 15-20k or more on a car, i should be able to beat the snot out of it as long as i did my maintenance and have zero problems.

Okay, I’ll bite too.

1.) Oil caked on the valves caused piston damage? How did you come up with this theory?

2.) The owners manual explains that the horsepower ratings were achieved using premium fuel, but that 87 octane is acceptible. You’re also on this forum, and it’s widely known across multiple forums that the car will run like crap unless you use 91+. Ford didn’t hide this fact.

3.) What maintenance/servicing can’t you meet on the 2.3? Changing oil every 7500-10k miles too tough? Not pulling out of your driveway at WOT with a cold motor too stressful? $30 on some new spark plugs every 100k miles putting some stress on your pocketbook? Seriously, the maintenance schedule is the same as almost every other motor out there, and this car even uses normal 5w30 semi-synthetic oil!

4.) How are you even comparing a turbo-4 to a powerstroke? Diesel issues have zero to do with any problems your Mustang has experienced, the only commonality is the brand name on the title.

5.) Since when does the cost of a car dictate how you can treat it? You can’t beat on any car and not expect issues, I don’t care if it’s a Bugatti or a Kia. You can drive spiritedly and not expect issues, but you can also drive like a grandma and potentially have trouble. Engines in general are a crapshoot, nobody makes one that is 100% fail proof. Be thankful most manufacturers stand behind their product for at least some time period, and the cost isn’t all on you from the get go.

With that said, PCV issues were semi-corrected with a TSB replacing the plate, and an inter cooler upgrade would do wonders for someone that only wants to run 87 while trying to beat on their car constantly. The EcoBoost wasn’t designed to be the performance model, but if you want it to be reliable for many years to come it can get there with just a couple of simple changes as long as your expectations aren’t insane.

These have been the hot rental model since 2015, and you sure don’t see them blowing up all over the place. I can promise most renters aren’t using 93 octane, and they damn sure don’t drive them nicely.

 

[1320INC]

I had a 1998 GT that I purchased with 120k on it. It was shifted at 6500-7000 rpm daily, I wrote over 100 different tunes for the car easily, drag raced in the NMRA Mod Muscle class for years(was top ten for 3 years in a row). It currently has 178k on it and has went 11.40's on 150 shot of nitrous on the same 100% stock longblock(sans the PI head swap). So you still think the EcoBoost motor is ok? The motor i just described had a 5950rpm factory rev limiter. It has pistons and rods that are cheap powdered metal and i can promise you some of my tunes were very sketchy as i was just learning how to tune.

My whole point being that as a factory turbo car the internals need to be stronger, there needs to be a little leeway given on what's "right" and what the owner is going to do.
I'm not irritated that mine blew up, i bought it that way. Im not trying to get into a pissing match with you,just stating the fact that this is a turbo charged mustang. The owner should be able to turn up the wick a bit without fear of it blowing up
.
And to the OP, sorry for mucking up your thread. You ship me your car, and a motor and ill do the swap for you. No charge. Thats how crappy i feel for you. My zip is 52216 if you want to check shipping charges.

 

[Billy1]

1320inc, Nice of you to offer to do the swap for free. The only puzzling thing here is that the OP made the opening post and just disappeared. Maybe he's stuck in the waiting room at the dealership.

 

[1320INC]

Man i hope not. Also forgot to add, I had dinner with guys from Livernois after the PRI show in Orlando once. Great group of guys, very dedicated to their profession.

 

[Maggneto]

Ok ill bite. 100% stock longblock,stock tune 61k destroyed #3 piston due to ?? The PCV system is inadequate, this causes the intake valves to have oil caked onto them...i can provide pics from said motor. Ford expects people to run these on 93 or 91 when in fact 87 or 89 is more prevalent. This is another Ford high performance motor that has maintenance and servicing expectations that most cannot meet. Add it to the 6.0,6.4 6.7 diesels among others. I can tell you if i spent 15-20k or more on a car, i should be able to beat the snot out of it as long as i did my maintenance and have zero problems.

There have been several reports of stock, non ECU tuned failures. The few that I have read about seem to have a cracked piston but no hole in the block as most ECU tuned failures. This suggests a different cause? How about poor quality fuel as a cause for some piston damage or some other cause?

Are some engines going to fail, yes. If you remove all the engine failures that were ECU tuned the list would be approximately 90% smaller. Once these engines were ECU tuned the engines failures started to mount. Also, the failures by tuner are not even as some tuners blow many more engines than others.

The 2.3 is used in rental fleets as another member points out, and other Ford and Lincoln vehicles. What we are not seeing are reports of 2.3 engine failures outside of the Stang community. The Focus had a head gasket issue that is unrelated to other 2.3 and corrected by Ford.

Are you the original owner of the car? Do you know the entire history of the car? How many times has someone claimed stock when in fact it was ECU tuned or otherwise modified. Visit any Ecoboost forum and the number of tuned failures greatly outnumbers the non ECU tuned failures. This is not luck. People who ECU tune and modify their engines are not more susceptible to buying defective cars, this is a ridiculous argument.

My car has the original PCV system and my wife uses 87 when she drives the car. No problems here. We use only top tier gas to help keep things clean. I do 0-60 pulls every time I leave my house for 3.5 years, no problems.

Livernois has been one of the more reliable tuners from what I read over the past few years vs. some of the other tuners. The few Livernois tuned failures I have read about were cracked pistons and were covered under Ford warranty.

Regardless of the Tuner, once you start ECU tuning or add modifications like catch cans, IC, etc you are adding risk. If 2.3 engines had some weakness or defect the failure rates would be even throughout the tuner community and between all models using the 2.3 engine, ECU tuned or not. This is clearly not the case as the overwhelming majority of failures are ECU tuned and/or modified.

 

[1320INC]

Im not the OP of this thread. I have extensive pics of my engine damage in my "ECOTERD" build thread. Im in the process of seeing if the tune in my car currently is the stock

 

[Maggneto]

Im not the OP of this thread. I have extensive pics of my engine damage in my "ECOTERD" build thread. Im in the process of seeing if the tune in my car currently is the stock

You purchased a bank repo with a blown engine that was obviously modified to an unknown extent, abused and not maintained properly. Based on the percentage of blown engines with ECU tunes there is a 90% chance that yours was previously ECU tuned.

Anywho, good luck with your build.

 

[1320INC]

Not sure where the 90% number comes from. ANY factory power adder engine has a higher rate of failure that an NA one. Stock or modified ECU. If you look at production numbers of the ecoboost in mustangs i would say it is a relatively low number of failures and hundreds that no one knows about due to the fact that not everyone is car person and gets on forums.

 

[Maggneto]

Not sure where the 90% number comes from. ANY factory power adder engine has a higher rate of failure that an NA one. Stock or modified ECU. If you look at production numbers of the ecoboost in mustangs i would say it is a relatively low number of failures and hundreds that no one knows about due to the fact that not everyone is car person and gets on forums.

90% is the number I have come up with, which is based on a few years of reading Ecoboom threads as a member of 2 Ecoboost forums since 2015. You are obviously new here, hundreds of Ecoboost Mustang engine failures that we don't know about? People don't go online when their engine fails because they are not car people? Come on dude, if you can't find it on the bitchernet it didn't happen. Go visit the issues and repairs section to see the 5.0 threads. This is what you find when there are hundreds of stock, non ECU tuned engine failures. When we read Ecoboom threads, they are nearly always tuned, and this goes for any Ecoboost forum.

We have heard it all on this forum brother so you are not shedding any light on the subject by throwing out numbers without any sources. You bought a modified, abused, poorly maintained, no known history, bank repo with a blown 2.3 engine so now there are hundreds of blown 2.3 Ecoboost engines that know one knows about?

The 2.3 engine is available in the Explorer, and MKC so where are these blown engine threads? I service at 2 dealerships and between the 2 of them not a single 2.3 Ecoboost engine has failed. They must all fail in Ohio I guess.

 

[1320INC]

You completely misread my last thread. You seem to like to argue. Not me. I know by doing, not typing. As you can see this "new member" completely dismantled a 2.3 yesterday. Did you? Or have you? Im gonna say probably not. Dealerships replace, not repair. Not bragging but " read it on the internet or saw it in a thread" is not the same as doing. Long story short, I will help this guy out. Ship the car to me 52216. I can find you a low mile engine for anywhere from $2000-3000. Shipping on engine will be $210.

 

[1320INC]

To further my point about you liking to argue, dont know who is from Ohio that you are referrring to..just shows you read what you wanted and hit reply. Im sorry but you think because YOU didn't read about it on 2 forums on the web that its not happening? Ever read about 3.5 V6 fords blowing up due to water pump gasket failures due to lack of coolant changes even though Ford recommended 100k between them? Must not be happening either then....smh
Have a nice xmas in fantasy land. Im done with this thread. There are one of you on every forum. All your replies are "I read"...lol.

 

[Coloradoeco]

Its funny you mention the Mkc, I have been looking at some used ones to replace my other car and scoured the web to find issues about the 2.3 in that car but found nothing. Now I just need to decide if im better off with the MKX

 

[ElAviator72]

2016 Spanish motors? Where the hell do you get your information?

Mid 2015 and beyond are Cleveland engines and when ECU tuned and otherwise basterdized,.they fail at a much higher rate than stock, non ECU tuned engines. I found that 90% of failures were ECU tuned along with other mods and in some cases user error.

Actually, no..,my first car, the 2015, which had a May 27th blend date, also had a Spanish engine...

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