We are owners of a 1997 GM, 60K miles, that blew its intake manifold on a trip to Tucson for our daughter's college orientation. The short story is we are out $1500 of expense that Ford should be responsible for. The Ford dealership we had the car towed to did not know of a service bulletin or recall regarding this plastic piece of s**t. I have sent an email to the law firm who has started the class action lawsuit and asked to be a party to it.

I have a 1996 Gt with the 4.6 and it just cracked. This really pisses me off that ford won't take care of their defects. Sign me up for the class action suit.

my mercury dealer replaced my cracked nylon 66 intake in july 2000 w/the same crappy nylon/plastic.since i read all these other failures,it has got me mad again.i do know that they had a better fix at that time(an aluminum crossover on front rather than plastic,but couldn't prove it.now,i know for sure they had a fix but apparently for ford police,taxi or fleet cars.see website www.lincolntowncar.org/repair/intakemanifold.html-my service rep at regency here in dallas said he'd never heard of this part.i called 2 ford dealer parts dept's and they gave me p/n f8az9424cb alum.crossover type & 9424aaa for total plastic one.ihaven't seen em but know they are avail.ford is lying to everyone when they say only plastic is available!

HELLO TO ALL YOU FORD OWNERS OUT THERE. MY MANIFOLD CRACKED THIS WEEK ON MY 1996 LINCOLN TOWN CAR AT 137,800 MILES. LOVE THE CAR SO I AM HAVING IT REPAIRED. SAVE YOUR BAD PARTS BECAUSE I WILL BET THAT FORD ENDS UP HAVING TO REIMBURSE ALL OF US WHO HAVE HAD THIS PROBLEM. THERE ARE WAY TO MANY OF US WITH THE PROBLEM FOR THEM TO IGNORE. IF A GOOD LAWYER CAN GET A WOMEN ONE MILLION FOR SPILLING HOT COFFEE ON HERSELF THAT SHE ORDERED, THERES GOT TO BE HOPE FOR A CASE INVOLVING THOUSANDS OF PEOPLE WITH THE SAME DEFECTIVE PART ON A CAR.TAKE CARE,WICK.

Correction my car has 82,000 miles ,not the 8200 miles as shown.

Last March I bought a 1997 Ford Crown Vic. with 82,00 miles on it. Beautiful, well takencare of ,ragtop car. Figured if it had a ragtop it couldn`t have been used as a police car.
In April, while driving back to MA. from Conway, NH.@ 70 mph my plastic manifold cracked,in the same
place as shown in your pictures,showering the car & engin in antifreeze fluid.
After a $200.00 tow back to MA., to a garage repair shop I have faith in,I found out it was going to cost about $1000.00 to repair.
Call FORD Customer Service with my Vin# & was told there was no recall for this problem & that they couldn`t help me.
Spent the $1000.00to have it repaired ,then found out the aluminum heads were warped by the heat & had to be remachined.
So far I`m over $2500.00 in repairs & thats alot for a guy 70 years old on a fixed income.
NOTE--Had I bought a used 1997 Crown Vic POLICE CAR .,I`d be covered on this RECALL!
PLEASE I WANT TO BE INCLUDED IN ANY CLASS ACTION SUIT........

Been adding small amounts of coolant since I bought my '97 Thunderbird @ 45,000 miles 2 years ago. Now coolant light came on, found leak at heater hose connection. Will call a new dealer tommorow, not the one that screwed me on steering work. 3rd bird, 91 V6 blew head gasket @ 100k, '94 V8 ran great till sold @ 110k, '97 V8 seen lots of problems @ 77k

On my way to work today, My 1997 Grand Marquis sharted spewing smoke from the hood. I was lucky and near an automobile tire and repair shop. I too have a plastic cracked intake manifold. It's at the dealer's tonight and will be hospitalized about 4 days. Even the guy at the tire shop knew about the problem with plastic manifolds, I did have AAA tow it to the dealer hoping I could find this site tonight after I was told there was no recall on the manifold by the dealer. I was lucky to find it so quickly. I was lucky at the tire shop. The guy at the tire shop looked up the cost of the part for me so I didn't go in the dealer blind, so maybe they will not try to take advantage of me. Sign me up for a class action. Maybe Ford needs some new Machanics because all of them know about this except the Ford Mechanics. I do have 94000 miles so I feel lucky it didn't happen sooner!! Well, I was luckly four times today but I guess I can't take that luck to Las Vegas, My money is going for car repair!!!

I have the same trouble with my intake on 1996 Crown Vic.
Got the same old run around from Ford.

Just finished talking to a nice customer service rep at Ford (1-800-392-3673) about the cracked intake on my 97 Merc; what a song and dance routine! From what this rep said, we can safely assume Ford feels it is OK if their products disintegrate as long as it is after the initial warranty is gone. What a bad joke to play on customers, and an expensive $770 Joke. My first Ford was a 1940 V8, my first new car(and favorite) was a 65 Mustang. Been a Ford customer for a long time. Looks like that is over now.

I own a '97 Grand Marquis. 87,000 miles. Intake Manifold blew while driving in rushhour on Freeway last week - spewing coolant everywhere - a real mess. Had to get towed home, 50 miles away. Missed an important meeting. When I recounted my grief later that evening to my neighbour, an experienced mechanic and owner of auto parts business, he knew immediately what the problem was without even looking at the engine. Said this is a common and very well known defect with this particular engine! Cost me about Can$1,000 to fix. This is my 7th Ford and third Grand Marquis - and if Ford dosen't deal fair with me, it'll be the last Ford product I ever buy (and I'll make a point of telling all others of my experience). Based on the comments of the many disgruntled Ford customers on this and other web-sites, it's little wonder that Ford is hurting right now!

I own a 1997 Cougar xr7 I bought it used, with only 26,000 on it at time of purchase, in December of 2000 the manifold cracked, lucky for me, the mechanic at the local Pep Boys knew of this problem and I went to a Ford service center and it was corrected (with another plastic manifold) under the recall and everything has gone smoothly so far, (I now have nearly 50K on the car, and frankly I think about it blowing again every time I get on the highway.) I will put an after market intake on my car after I finish paying for it. Thanks for putting up this website. I hope Ford makes things right with everyone that has had problems.

I have a 1997 grand marquis with 66,000 miles Just had he same problem wiht manifold cost to repair 700 dollars. I have lodged a complaint with ford customer service no satisfaction

when the intake on my 96 marq.blew in jul 2000,i exited freeway asap,pulled into station.raised hood-coolant all over top of engine-a customer there walked up,sez what's wrong?told him hose or something blew(at 48Kmiles!}he then said he was a ford mechanic from houston-they had been replacing many plastic intakes on crown vic's w/aluminum area on front.when i asked my dealer rep (regency of dallas)he said there was no aluminum fix-so they put the all plastic back in.ford has been screwing all their customers w/the 4.6 engine w/plastic intakes and lied also!

I'm glad, yet sorry, to find this page. Would that it were not necessary. Similar story here: mine went on my 1996 Grand Marquis on Thursday afternoon while doing 75 mph on I-95 (thankfully, I was on my way to my mechanic's at the time.) And I'm blessed to have a mechanic who, when I told him I couldn't come *close* to affording this repair, told me "just let me get the car fixed so you have transportation, and we'll talk about the rest later."
I guess I'll have to join up with the others on the lawsuit. But I've seen several noted on the internet - the one at www.cbycb.com and one at http://www.lrolaw.com/investigation.html
I wish everyone the best in trying to deal with this!