FORD CAR PARTS UK : Not really, although there are some purists who consider them to be lessso. There is the famous line from the TVR boss on a national TVprogramme here about "Not having bloody German engines in my cars!" whenBMW were negotiating to buy Rover. TVR's are now supplied with TVRdesigned and built engines rather than the Rover engines of a few yearsago - but many of the parts are still recognisable as common to Ford andother cars. (Which was quite fortunate for a friend of mine whose TVRbroke down on the motorway recently - when the AA mechanic arrived hewas quite negative about his ability to fix anything because it was sucha rare car - until he looked under the bonnet and recognised OEM partsthat were the same as more popular cars!)
FORD CAR PARTS UK : Hard to say - Jaguar had a MUCH worse reputation for quality andconstruction in the US than it ever had in the UK. There are a lot ofreasons for this (less extreme climate over here, generally shorterjourneys, better car care culture amongst the general public, morecommon dealership support etc.) Of course improved reliability (I trynot to use the term 'quality' because its definition in manufacturingindustry is NOT what the term means to the general public) is seen asdesirable in the UK market as much as in any other, but I doubt thatmany Brits would associate reliability as something that Ford have beenresponsible for bringing to the market - quite the opposite! It's notso long ago that Ford had almost as bad a reliability reputation overhere as Jaguar appear to have had over there! I would guess than mostBrits consider that Ford have been dragged kicking and screaming tomatch the reliability offered by the Japanese companies, like Nissan,Honda and . . . . . Mazda! The last car that actually broke down on mewas French - a Renault Mégane Scenic, about 3 weeks ago.
FORD CAR PARTS UK : I remember a documentary in the late 1960's where the topic of rust-proofing was raised. The journalist interviewed a spokesman from Fordwho assured him that other than painting the vehicles, there was nothingthat could be done to rust-proof a car. The next interview was with aspokesman from one of the 'up-market' then British manufacturers (Idon't recall exactly who, but I think it was Jaguar or Rolls-Royce) whoinsisted that all of their vehicle body parts were treated to rustproofthem before they were painted. Then came the crunch line "I am notfamiliar with the details of the process, we send the parts to the Fordplant in Dagenham and they do it for us"!! ;-)Things have improved since then, but the general impression is that Fordhave not exactly been in the vanguard - they have simply followed whatthe Japanese have made available to the public. My '91 had no visiblerust on it at all when I sold it earlier this year. Similarly pricedFords of the same age in that condition are few and far between. (Andsimilar Rover's are like hen's teeth!)
FORD CAR PARTS UK : There are plently of places that supply discount OE parts for othermanufacturers (such as Euro car parts), are there any for Ford bits such asbrake discs and batteries etc.? Must be OE parts, not pattern parts - surelythere's someone selling them cheaper than the dealers...What exactly do you mean by OE and pattern ? If it just has to come in a Fordbox then the only place to go is Ford. There is a wholesale branch of the Fordparts network that sells parts for "new build" operations like kit carmanufacturers. You have to agree that the parts are not going to be used forgeneral maintenance activities (which of course everyone signs to regardless)and then you can get bits at 1/3 to 1/2 of the dealer price.But plenty of "pattern" parts are made by the same companies that make the OEitems. Ford don't actually make anything themselves I hope you realise. TRWmake their valves for example and you can buy a TRW valve that looks exactlylike the Ford valve and comes off the same production line except without aFord number stamped into it. The same applies to most of the other parts thatgo to make up a car. There is nothing wrong with the vast majority ofaftermarket parts for almost any car. In fact most large companies work fromthe same blueprints and material specifications and quite often a designweakness gets improved on by the aftermarket when the OE deficiency isrealised.
FORD CAR PARTS UK : Having just spent an unhappy afternoon underneath the car trying to replace thef*&%ing useless seized solid steering column u/j on a MK3 Fiesta (which everyowner has to go through on a regular basis) you don't really think that justbecause a part is OE it is actually guaranteed to work properly do you ?Several Ford models are renowned for brake discs warping, the cam design andmaterial choice on both the Pinto and CVH was crap, the little pushbuttonswitches for fog lights etc fail on a regular basis, the door locks are shiteand seize within a few years - I could go on.... and who in god's name cares whether a car has an OE battery or not ??It might look like I'm doing nothing but I'm really actively waiting for thingsto sort themselves out.
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