Now that we're finally rid of it (so I didn't jinx myself with a catastrophic failure), I figured I'd share the story on here in the OT section. I'll break it into 3 posts - background + buying + maintenance to avoid one giant wall of text.

BACKGROUND

I've always been a GM guy and have owned nothing but. My parents were the same way and their parents/ immediate family were also 90%+ GM (a few family members worked in GM service, others worked for companies producing GM stuff, etc). But when we were looking to replace our 08 Impala, we couldn't find something that fit our wants.

We were expanding our family and wanted something a bit bigger than the Impala we had. We started off our search with the Equinox (which was bigger at the time before they scaled it down with the recent refresh), but it had a big downside for us - terrible rear airflow. There were no console / roof vents in back, so the only direct air came from under the front seats (and was very poor at that). The salesman reccomended 'the elephant snout' (basically an aftermarket tube that hooked to the front upper vent that snaked through the interior like dryer duct) - lol, no thanks.

The GMC equivalent on that platform had the same issue (although it did have a few other of the bells and whistles we wanted).

So the only option with GM was to just deal with it or get something larger, neither of which we were excited about.

We set out looking into other brands and after lots of test driving + research, we ended up with either the Ford Edge (newly updated for 2015) or the Nissan Murano.

What ultimately killed the Murano (despite my wife liking it more) was the CVT. The salesman confidently stated you could get either a CVT or 6 sp auto during our initial trip there, so I took that as the truth. When we came back to do final test drives on our top 2 / make a decision, we found out they were CVT only (which for me was a deal breaker, especially given Nissan's issues with them).

So thats how we got started on the Ford Edge hunt.

 

BUYING

The whole thing started off on a bad foot, and its a long story so it deserves its own section. As a preface, I absolutely can't stand dealerships/ car sales people - practically every experience at either sales or service has been a negative one for me.


Being our first new car ever, we were somewhat picky on options (as you could be at the time given every dealer we went to had at least a dozen in stock). We wanted the Titanium level trim w/ the tech package, the 2.0L turbo, and a color other than white/black/silver.

After scrubbing local dealers inventory online for several weeks, we found a good match. It checked all of our boxes (but had the panoramic sunroof which we were indifferent about). It was a bit of a drive (a little over an hour - the furthered dealer we were considering), but everything looked good.

The information online showed a good price for the car (several thousand off MSRP as was common back then - was actually a fairly good deal compared to what others seemed to be paying) and we filled out the info for our trade that also came out to what I was hoping to get (right about in the upper middle of the KBB trade in range/ at the very low end of the private party range).

As usual, when we get there, the BS starts. The website mentioned 'additional fees - tax, title, and doc fee', but it didn't mention the $4k worth of useless add ons that brought the car nearly back up to sticker again. Nice bait + switch... Then they cut the offer on our used car in half citing "it wasn't in as good of shape as we'd explained it online". This was the first point where I should've walked out. We spent probably 4-5 more hours going back and forth just to get back to the online prices and had I thought that was even remotely possible up front, I wouldnt have wasted my time.

In the end, we got within a few hundred bucks of the #s provided online, so I just wanted to move forward and get it done with. We shook on a deal with the sales manager, and then he came back and said he'd went too far on my trade in and had to come down $250 there to be able to make tbe deal. He refused to honor the deal he personally shook on. Im still blown away by this today as I've never had a person back down on a deal they shook on. This is the 2nd point I should've walked (for good) and I still regret not doing so. I was stupid from being so tired and reluctantly agreed as I didn't want to repeat this whole process somewhere else over a couple hundred bucks.


The last issue with the purchase process came from one of the mandatory dealer options, tint. It was a $500 add on (basically 250/ window as they only did the front 2) and the drivers window had bubbles/ FOD (I could see stuff in the bubbles, it wasn't just an air pocket). They agreed to redo them after letting it sit a few days in the sun if they didn't go away.

We make an appt the next Saturday as they didn't go away on the drivers window (as the FOD kept the tint from sitting flat on the glass). As soon as they brought it out, I immediately knew they didn't replace it as agreed because I could still see one of the most prominent FOD spots on the inside (dark spot with a halo around it from the tint tented up over it). The "installer" had just taken a heat gun and tried to scrub it back down instead of actually replacing it (which scratched the tint up locally as well).

I told her we had an appt to re tint it, and that's what I want done. This turned into a huge ordeal as supposedly the tint guy already left as we were the only job for him that day. I threw an absolute fit about it and got all kinds of management involved (as I didn't want to repeat the 2 hour round trip drive, when clearly the guy didn't do what we asked). They did finally get him to come back and do the job right, and after waiting several hours for a single window tint, that was the last we ever saw of that dealership.


They definitely got us for our time and about $500 total in the end (from the price I was given online), but in the end it only hurt them. Between issues with the car and issues with the purchase, we've kept at least a dozen people from going to that dealer specifically. Sure started out the ownership experience on a sour note though...

 

MAINTENANCE

(excluding standard wear and tear)
​​​This was the worst part of the experience by far though the maintenance. Ive never run the numbers exactly (as we usually purge records for old cars once they're gone), but Im certain that in both $ spent and # of issues that this thing was worse than at least half of all of the GM cars I've owned combined - likely closer to 3/4.

Here is a list of the things I remember in roughly chronological order. As usual- the car was absolutely flawless through the end of the warranty, almost like there is some kind of countdown timer. This stretches from new through about 7 years / 150k miles:

1. Drivers side HID bulb goes out. Not a big deal, but OEM bulb is very expensive. Picked up an aftermarket one that was about $100 with tax. Of course the color temperature isn't an exact match, but oh well.
2. Exterior plastic trim in front of sunroof failed (clips broke) so it started slapping the roof going down the highway as the edge clips held on. Got ahold of the TSB and installed a new replacement piece per that. TSB essentially had you add a huge blob of windshield sealant im several additional spots between the clips to keep it from breaking the clips again- classy...
3. Navigation failed. Diagnosed as just the SD card. Bought the latest map upgrade and it worked fine again.
4. Evap purge valve broke. Problem is that no one could figure out the PN including the dealer parts counter (different dealer from vehicle purchase). Apparently unlike older GMs, its not serviceable by itself, you have to buy this 2 hose assy with this valve + another permanently attached. The other hose isn't even part of the evap system, but because they're literally zip tied together in a few spots its all on PN. No clue how the dealer / service dept couldn't figure this out - I got lucky someone on the forums had been down the same path and saved his receipt.
5. Hatch electrical latch / lock broke. Hatch was closed and wouldn't open because the lock wouldn't let go. Spent half a day crawling in and out / laying in the hatch floor in the heat to get it released + replaced.
6. Fan relay broke closed. Really random one as I've never had this on any car before. Wife mentioned the fan never shut off after leaving the car and it was hard to start when she came back. Got her through the rest of the day (as she needed the car) by popping the hood + pulling the fuse at every appointment she had to go to the rest of the day.
7. Both front hubs failed around 50 or 60k. We were in a rental house at the time (with a no repairs policy), but I couldn't push it anymore. The thing was roaring like a monster truck down the highway.
8. Proximity sensors (for obstacles) around the car started to freak out about 2-3 times a week. Mostly happened when coming up to a stoplight nearing 0 mph (it would beep and show an obstacle right at the proxy sensor red zone by one of the doors). Never did figure this out, although cleaning the sensors seemed to cut occurrence in half.
9. Severe coolant loss - twice. Noticed the car dripping coolant after driving one day (maybe 60 or 70k). Popped the hood an everything was soaked. It lost about 2 quarts and then suddenly stopped. Cleaned everything up and it didn't happen again for about 60k miles (and never again after that). Best I can tell, it came from the connections on the turbo at the rear but it was impossible to diagnose when it stopped completely after one big spray.
10. AC compressor failed and sent trash into the system. Had just moved and had no tools accessible, so I was forced to pay to fix it (as it was also mid summer). $2500 down the drain.
11. Sunroof got very slow around 75k miles. I did the whole clean + lube procedure on all of the various tracks it rides in, but I suspect the motor was just getting weak. Stopped opening it completely for fear of failure. We barely opened it once or twice a year (wife hated it).
12. Front drivers brake line blew in the rubber section. Wife almost wrecked it as performance severely dropped off while driving. Limped it to a dealer for a replacement (again, no tools accessible due to move). Later get recall on this issue for both fronts, but "no parts in stock".
13. Out of sequence, but the passenger side failed before they got parts. Had it towed to a dealer and they did both (magically had parts). This issue is a big one that turned me off to Ford. Its a safety critical system and should be #1 priority to get right. Even though the brakes still technically work witha giant hole in the line, performance is still way worse (especially when it just stopped fine at the last light). IMO always made my wife a bit timid with driving / braking through the end due to no trust.
14. Drivers side HID failed again. Researched and got a better aftermarket brand through Rock auto. Still almost $100 though...
15. Lane keep system stopped working, but Im not sure when exactly. The area we used to live in was bad for rocks (we went through 3 or 4 windshields on this car alone while living there). System calibrated fine one time, but not the last. Got INS to put an OEM windshield in, but didn't fix it. They agreed to let a dealer diagnose, but Id be responsible for the $ if shown it was something other than what the windshield tech touched. As we didn't know how long it had been broken for, I just let it go.
16. AC broke again. Took it back to the dealer that did the compressor (2 yr warranty) and of course they say its the unit under the dash - and thats another $2500 ish. Lol nope. Leak was very small as I recharged it without issues and it stayed cold for 2 weeks between. Finally dumped some stop leak in it (as the actual repair looked horrendous to DIY even though parts were only $300) and it fixed it an held up the last 25k miles.
17. Engine seal started leaking. Not sure which, but it felt like a valve seal (puff of blue on startup occasionally). As it wasn't very heavy and the car was getting up there in mileage, I did the hack job thing here and dumped in some seal conditioner. Poof problem solved... (I still feel like a hack for doing it though)
18. Passenger HID bulb failed. Luckily Id bought a pair from rock auto last time with how often they went out. I get light bulbs are technically wear and tear, but nearly $300 in headlights is absurd. If they'd failed again, my plan was to retrofit (de retrofit?) halogens.
19. Sunroof shattered. Not sure when, but we opened the cover while looking for a new car as it was a nice day and surprise - theres cracks everywhere. After a thorough inspection, it appears to be a spontaneous break as there are no chunks/ impact points and several people online have had spontaneous cracking (in some cases going through 2 or 3). Lots of people mentioned getting a lawyer involved as Ford seemed to universally reject these under warranty even. $1k for parts only (luckily it was an easy DIY replacement).

I think thats it for the main issues - may have missed a few, but you get the idea.

 

MISC

A few other tidbits:

• Got a recall 6 mo ago for the shifter bushing coming out / car not going into park like the shifter indicates. They never did get parts...
• Got an extended warranty notice for broken flexplate (what prompted us to sell ASAP) thru Q2 of 2023. Im not 100% sure ours was broken, but it was very loud on cold starts (sounded like a diesel) and had a relatively rough idle. I didn't want anything to do with the inspection process (dealers were backed up 3 weeks just to look at it) or the intensive fix (pull engine + transmission, replace flex, converter, and transmission fluid pump) even if it was free.
• This thing ate batteries like crazy. Almost every 2 years on the dot it would kill a battery regardless the brand.
• The Ford parts system is horrendous. The local dealer couldn't figure out what rotors I even had up front. Rock auto / autozone were out (but I did get front + back pads + back rotors). Dealer sold me some rotors using my VIN. They didn't fit - they were at least 1" too small. Go back and they try another. These are 1/2" too big and the wrong bolt patten for lugs. They say there are a couple more PNs they can try, but they're all special order only (and we don't know for sure if they'll match until they arrive / compare). So I just scuffed up the originals and ran them through the end.
• One off parts. Had two issues with this: rear wiper blade is carried by almost no one. Autozone stocks it, but only had 1 in the entire major metro area.
• One off parts x2. Hood struts. Both went bad (ok, normal wear and tear), but you can literally only buy them from Ford due to the oddball bent end on one side.
• Cracked cylinder liner. I don't think this ever happened to us, but it always made me paranoid. Saw numerous posts on the forums and FB about 2.0L ecoboosts from one engine factory cracking a sleeve on one of the inner cylinders + leaking coolant into it. Only fix is an engine replacement of course... with the car up at 150k+ miles, its practically totalled for someone who has to pay dealer / oem prices for a failure like that.

 

WOW! SO much I pulled from this.

1. - I am probably an odd ball, I still have folders with info of all my previous cars. But these days, I upped my game to a spreadsheet many years ago (before CarFax offered a service for people to input their DIY services, which I'll stick to my private spreadsheets). But only the one for the Montes did I include a "cost" column. For my daily, cost is a bit of an "eh" topic. I am more into tracking when I did something, the mileage and where I bought it and the warranty info.

2. - What you mentioned about GM is a bit of an issue I have been seeing. For years, I used to know what my "next" car interest was. But these days, I really don't. Feels like GM is heavily exiting the car market in favor of SUVs, Crossovers and the Corvette (and Camaro that they may end claiming no demand when they are unable to meet demand). I actually made a post somewhere here wondering if we have seen the end of an era with at least GM cars. I had tons of luck with v6 Grand Ams as commuter cars, but that ended in 2005, replaced with the G6 and I was not impressed. And GM just phased out more and more cool cars and I feel never replaced them. I admit, @ChibiBlackSheep had his wife's 2018 Buick TourX wagon at the GM Nationals due to a Camaro Crisis. This was the first time I rode in this Buick and I admit, I am impressed. BUT.... GM ended production of that. I could totally enjoy something like that. I partially joked than when him and his wife are doing with it, they may have a buyer for it lol!! We'll just have to see what happens. Personally, I am hoping to get maybe another 4 years on my 2004 Grand Am before northern Ohio rust claims the car (it still looks pretty good on the outside, under side is "ok", I have seen worse).
Bottom line, GM is forcing people like me who want cars to potentially go elsewhere. I too have a big loyalty in GM as well as family who does too. At one point, my dad, step mom, two step brothers, my sister and I ALL drove a Pontiac (Grand Am or Grand Prix).

3. - The fact you had so many problems with the Edge that seemed to compound after warranty, not even making it to 100k and some of these problems (like brakes, which later had a recall) are HUGE in my book! Cars have been built for YEARS to go to 100k miles and beyond without anything beyond brakes and tires (normal consumables). MAYBE a light bulb or interior button with an issue, big deal.

So, did I miss something, you guys are rid of the Edge, what replaced it?

 

We used to save a lot of old ones too (depending where the car ended up). The handful we sold private party, I gave the new owner the records so those were almost empty - but most of the rest we purged during our last move to condense file cabinet space. Now I just have a single folder for 'old cars' with the final sale paperwork.

That's a great idea! I wonder if theres a reasonably priced option for Excel on Android? My issue is I don't hardly ever use our home laptop anymore and its getting very old now (which makes me use it even less). For personal stuff, our phone has taken over nearly all of that functionality unless there is a specific website that absolutely requires Windows to properly function.

I used to not think about it much at all (outside of usual car guy browsing for cool stuff that makes no financial sense) until I got rear ended in my GP GXP by a semi. So while dealing with that mess, I was suddenly scrambling to figure out what to buy.

Since then, I've had some kind of plan for both of our dailys, just in case we suddenly lose one. We usually go to the auto shows every year anyways, so its just been a matter of us being more deliberate as we're browsing around (ie, we have no car and X dollars - what do we buy?).

I know what you mean on the car side of things (as my DD is a GTO) as I have zero interest in driving a SUV. I think a Camaro would be my first stop if considering new today as its the most similar to what I've got now - but Im probably 95% certain I'll end up somewhere on the used market for mine - lower mileage G8, caprice, ctsv, etc.

Of course unless my GTO gets totalled somehow, it's going to be quite awhile. Its got 90k on it now, but between us moving closer to our work places and the post covid shift allowing a heavy amount of work from home, I'm not going to burn through cars anywhere near as fast as I used to.

We were the same way with 3800 W cars. We had several Impalas, GP, etc back to back with great luck (which then drove family members to buy them too). I wasnt really thrilled with our only 'new body' Impala (08 / 3500). It was the worst car we've had for maintenance (before this Edge - granted it was mostly cheap / stupid stuff) and IMO was a step backwards in almost every way from the 00 body style. It sure made me not overly interested to try another Impala when we were done with that last one / got the Edge (plus my wife didn't help as she wanted a SUV).

I completely agree. As Id mentioned a few paragraphs above, I'm near certain my DD replacement would end up being a used GM (which certainly doesn't help their business case for selling new cars).

Unfortunately the budget for my DD and my preferences (V8, RWD, preferably manual) don't line up well with the cost of new cars these days anyways so its probably not worth me even getting my hopes up.


Thats exactly the experience we've had too and why I was so reluctant to let the Edge go (as I'd planned finances around it making it to 200k like we've done with numerous GM cars).

We've never had any real issues before 100k (the GP GXP transmission issue being the one outlier, but that's a well known specific issue) - like you mentioned, its usually just oil, fluids, and brakes up to that point. Then 100-150k we'd get maybe 1 small failure (alternator, starter, etc) and then 150k-200k we'd get a handful of small-moderate failures before ultimately letting the car go.

So having this many failures even before 100k was alarming (plus the two major AC failures after) I was really getting worried we'd have a catastrophic failure that would wipe out the entire value of the car before 200k, so I wanted to get rid of it while it was still worth something rather than keep rolling the dice and telling myself - its got to be fine now after all of this work...

We got a 23 Traverse this time (theres another thread in OT about it).

Wife wanted something the same size or a little bigger (as we've got a lot of home reno projects going on) and it fit the bill perfectly. I'm also MUCH happier with the 3.6 over the turbo 2.0L.


We're down a couple mpg, but not drastically different (which is almost completely offset by not having to run premium as this car runs great on regular whereas the Edge pulled power like crazy to make it work). I love having mid range power back. That 2.0 was great at WOT and steady state cruising, but everything in between was a mess (as you had to get the turbo spooled up to get going- usually coupled with several downshifts to make any power at all).

I am a little worried about the 9t65 as there's plenty of horror stories out there, but I'll just do my usual / overkill fluid changes and hope for the best. We did buy the tow package (despite having very little desire to actually tow) in the hopes that thr larger radiator and transmission cooler will keep the transmission + coolant temps much closer to 200 despite the intense heat.

 

I use an iPhone (work provide it, so I cannot complain). But Android being Google, I know via a web browser on my PC, if you have a GMail account (which I think you are forced to have for an Android phone), you can use Google Drive and a web-based spreadsheet program. So that becomes a perfect solve. My dad and I use that Google method to track data for our Silverado that I just did fuel lines on. Or, if you feel like helping CarFax have data on your vehicle, you can always use there interface. It might just be me, but, I prefer not to use CarFax because they have control of the data I store and I have no idea what they are going to do with it. I also would expect it to be free for me to drop new records, BUT they could always change terms at any time. Plus, if I want to customize certain things about the data I track, they may or may not give me that flexibility.

I totally understand GM looking toward different engine topics and such. But you hit the nail about your family loved the W cars and helped influence other people to them. The N body cars are the same. I can still go to the junk yard and find Grand Ams by throwing a rock. So many of those were sold and despite the numerous amounts in the yards, there are still so many on the road! Pretty crazy! But I also know if cars last too long, its tough for auto sales and service garages and such. But you can't go from "cars are problem free for 100k" to what you had with the Edge "The car is problem free until the warranty gives out". Consumers want better not worse. Notice how the Ford logo on modern Fords fad out to be all silver (the blue goes away). I used to joke "as your warranty expires, the manufacture's logo disappears", it's kinda like saying "ford knows it's bad and when you have problems they want to distance the brand".

 

Haha. I've noticed the logo fade on the fleet of Fords at work. And I'm glad I didn't take a chance on a new Edge, it was nice sitting there on lot but all I could think was man that's a lot of $$ for this? Also looked at Muranos and the deal killer there was the e-brake pedal sticking out in the footwell in the way of my big feet.

Great post @bumpin96monte.

 

I'll have to try that out. Would sure be nice to have that info readily at hand without having to dig through piles of paperwork and faded receipts.

I do wonder how many of my issues were from breaking one of my main rules to car buying- not buying a first year of a new model. It definitely seemed like people on the forums with later years had many fewer issues (someone had mentioned Ford was on its 4th part revision for that sunroof glass - so potentially making changes as they went to reduce the number of failures).

I'll never find out at this point though because now any mention of Ford conjures up images of breakdowns and repairs to me.


Our logo was rather faded as well (actually the whole car was noticeably faded over original despite regular paint upkeep).

The bad thing is I made it worse with a clear bra. I wrapped the whole bumper, but when it came to the hood, I cheaped out and only did a 18" strip (as the hood was relatively horizontal besides the first few inches). I didn't realize 3m clear bra material blocked UV (not sure if its designed to, or what % it blocks), but there was a very obvious line on the hood of faded vs pristine paint (that used to be under the clear bra).

 

I know a few people who have that rule. Never buy the first year of a new vehicle OR first year of a new generation of that vehicle. Never buy the first year of a new engine design either. The entire idea is as you pointed out, by people using the vehicle, they begin to correct issues found in it. I think I recall hearing the first year Focus supposedly had a lot of issues (partly trying to be a "cheap" car). Interesting enough, a few years ago, I fixed an issue that was common on a newer 4 door focus. I believe it is the trunk light doesn't work right or it was the power trunk pop doesn't work. Whatever the issue was blew my mind how absurd it was. In a bundle of wires, by normal operation of the trunk lid, the ground wire breaks (gets cut or worn, I sadly don't recall). What I do recall, the problem was ridiculous and a silly design fault. I spliced in a little extra wire, soldered it and used heat shrink tubing, secured it safely to avoid a repeat issue. Just blew my mind.

Really makes the jokes "Found On Road Dead", "Fix Or Repair Daily" and "Factory Ordered Road Disaster" feel less like jokes (and for the record, I know a few others, these were most applicable to your comment).