Why are Ford Ranger and Everest recalled in Australia?

Ford Ranger has faced its fair share of problems since that launch, including harshness or vibration at certain times when driving, as well as warning messages on the dash, blank digital instrument clusters, and various mechanical and electrical issues.

Australia has recalled both the new Ford Ranger and Ford Everest over an issue that may cause the transmission to shift into park on its own, according to CarExpert.

They've "only recalled the 4,841 examples of the current-gen Ford Ranger and Everest produced in the 2021-2023 model years. The problem seems to be a software issue, but only occurs when the battery level has dropped below a certain threshold. Due to a software issue, under certain circumstances if the battery level drops below a critical threshold, the transmission may shift into park when the vehicle is traveling at speeds below 6 km/h,” the recall states.

Earlier this year, reports from abroad emerged of the new Ford Ranger experiencing problems such as software glitches, leading to nine units being replaced in the Australian market in the first six months it was on sale. Now, it seems like the South African market experienced the same thing.

Ford South Africa found a slightly disconnected pin in one of the many connectors on the wiring harness, which was solved by plugging it back in correctly, or in cases where damages were apparent, replacing the entire harness.

Another cause for unresponsive screens in models on Ford Ranger and Everest built in Thailand and exported to other countries was battery drain. Apparently the issues were found on early units and Ford said it found the reason for the leak and fixed it at the source, i.e. the production line, and no other vehicles have suffered from it since.

Ford South Africa now puts imported models in a special low-power mode while they’re being shipped to avoid unnecessary drain. Ford now requires all its dealers to perform pre-delivery updates, ensuring all its customers’ cars are running the latest tech the moment they are handed the keys.

When initially starting the Ranger or Everest its assistance systems ping each other to ensure they are all working, and sometimes one of them may be out of sync by a few milliseconds and a warning will appear on the driver screen stating that function is temporarily unavailable.

This warning will only stay for six seconds as that’s how long it takes for the systems to ping each other again as a failsafe, making sure they are 100% operational. If it doesn’t go away, it could be something a technician might have to look at, but thus far there have been no cases of this, said Ford.

If it was a “systemic issue”, Ford determined when that particular unit was built using VIN data and notified all the owners of bakkies made before it that they may need to go to a dealer to get it taken care of if an over-the-air software update won’t do the trick.

Before, Ford subsidiaries across the globe also didn’t share very much data with each other, leaving many to solve problems on their own. Now, the entities are in contact “every day” discussing the issues they found and how they solved them.

This turns out to be a big advantage for the customer, as the majority of operational adjustments that the Thai plant had to make to bring down issues in the Ranger were implemented in the South African factory before it started production, leading to but a handful of warranty claims from the 4,000-plus Rangers sold in the country over the past few months.

Additionally, Ford South Africa is now in much more frequent contact with its dealers and suppliers, with the shared knowledge drastically cutting down on repair time.

If the owner has activated FordPass in their new Ranger or Everest, the company can now enter the VIN number and within three minutes identify the fault code and alert the dealer of the required fix before the car even arrives.

According to repairpal.com, the Ford Ranger scores four out of five in reliability, which puts it above average and in third out of seven other midsize trucks.

Maybe they should reduce this high driving thing or does the Ford Ranger have wings?