13/02/2018

Ford expands pickup truck warning

Reuters reports that Ford Motor Co has had to warn a further 33,000 owners of pickup trucks in North America that they contain potentially defective Takata air bag inflators.

In January 2018 Ford informed 2,900 owners of ford Rangers model year 2006 that they should immediately stop driving the vehicles due to a second death linked to the inflators.

After additional testing, Ford has contacted owners of the vehicles from a greater time period of production to let them know their vehicles are potentially unsafe and need the air bag inflator replacing. Around 90% of the affected vehicles are in the United States.

Mazda Motor Corp said it was issuing a similar expansion for about 1,800 2006 Mazda B-Series trucks that were built by Ford after it had issued a warning for 160 trucks in January.

The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA) said the vehicles pose 'an immediate risk to safety' and urged owners to immediately schedule a free repair.

The faulty inflators have led to the largest automotive recall in history. The other 20 deaths have occurred in Honda Motor Co vehicles, most of which were in the United States.

Takata said in June it has recalled, or expected to recall, about 125 million vehicles worldwide by 2019, including more than 60 million in the United States. About 19 automakers worldwide are affected.

Takata inflators can explode with excessive force, unleashing metal shrapnel inside cars and trucks and have injured more than 200 people. The defect led Takata to file for bankruptcy protection in June.