Dearborn, MI. – Jan. 24, 2017 – Ford Motor Company (NYSE:F) has recalled more than 2,700 vehicles believed to contain defective Takata air bag inflators, according to documentation submitted to the National Highway Transportation Safety Administration. The recalls involves 2006 Ford Ranger pickup trucks. The automaker is unsure how many of the recalled vehicles actually contain the defective air bags, which are at the center of a multiyear automotive safety scandal involving more than 46 million vehicles worldwide from over two dozen brands. The flawed safety features have claimed 20 lives, the Los Angeles Times reported.
Recall summary
Affected models may include front air bag assemblies with defective Takata inflators that are prone to rupture upon activation, sending metal shards throughout the cabin of the vehicle. These features pose a serious safety hazard to occupants. Two Ford Ranger owners have been killed in crashes involving the defective Takata air bag inflators, the second of which occurred this past July, according to the car company. As a result, Ford has advised owners to discontinue operating their vehicles.
In May 2015, Ford recalled more than 361,000 vehicles after Takata notified the NHTSA of an impending safety action surrounding its passenger-side air bag inflator models, documents submitted to the government agency showed. The Ford recall involved 2004-2006 Ranger pickup trucks produced between March 24, 2003 and May 4, 2006. Ford began replacing the Takata inflators in with stopgap parts in July 2015.
In December 2017, Ford launched another recall involving the same vehicles due to the development of permanent repair components, which did not contain phase-stabilized ammonium nitrate propellant, according to the NHTSA. Ford sent notification letters to owners Dec. 12 and began the inflator replacement process. Approximately 11 days later, the automaker received an accident report detailing a fatal crash that had occurred in West Virginia July 1. The tragic incident involved a 2006 Ford Ranger with Takata driver-side air bag inflators that had ruptured upon deployment. This was confirmed during a physical inspection of the vehicle Dec. 27.
Takata engineers reviewed the ruptured air bag inflators and found that others from the same production population had been involved in an accident in 2006. The belonged to a propellant lot that had not appeared in previous recalls.
Ford reviewed its production records and narrowed down the vehicles that included inflators from the same lot. On January 8, 2018, the Ford Field Review Committee decided to launch a voluntary recall to address the dangerous parts. The car manufacturer recalled 3,902 vehicles worldwide – 2,712 in the U.S. market and 190 in the Canadian market.
The repair
The automaker has directed dealers to replace the front air bag inflators in affected vehicles free of charge, according to a recall acknowledgement document from the NHTSA. Ford notified dealers of the recall on Jan. 10 and contacted owners on Jan. 16 via first-class mail.
Is your vehicle part of the recall?
Over 2,700 vehicles were originally part of this recall. Since then, the recall has expanded to include 28,365 vehicles. As of April 9, 2021 – the last date information was available – 21,775 airbags had been replaced. To see if your car still needs to be repaired, use MotorSafety’s free lookup tool.
