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Power Steering Loss 2015 - 2016 Explorers Only

mwaller1027

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Joined
May 24, 2016
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City, State
East New Market, MD
Year, Model & Trim Level
2016 Ford Explorer XLT
Two weeks ago my 4 month old 2016 Ford Explorer completely lost power steering after the dashboard lit up like Times Square with multiple repeated faults and error messages. We had just entered a parking garage, proceeded about two car lengths past a speed bump (over which we had proceeded at about 3 mph), started to turn left and the steering wheel just froze! While in motion, I was not able to steer my vehicle. The wheel did not lock into place like with a click or such. It would move about a 1/2" to the right and 1/2" to the left but would not turn the wheels at all. I could move forward or reverse but only straight in front or behind. This meant I had to inch up to the car parked directly in front of me so that other incoming traffic could squeeze by. Only other option was to back up into a concrete pillar. After several minutes of cycling the key on and off, the steering would not return. I continued to receive the following faults/errors over and over:
Terrain Management System Fault
Service AdvanceTrac
Hill Assist Fault
After 30 minutes on the phone with Ford Roadside Assistance, who was proposing to tow my car to the nearest dealership and leave myself, my hubby and two young children stranded for the remainder of the weekend 2-1/2 hours from home, the darn thing finally freed up. At 2 a.m. we proceeded to drive very slowly, white knuckled all the way back home and did the same Monday morning in getting it to our local dealer.

They have had it for two weeks now and of course, none of the 30+ errors/faults ever recorded on the vehicle, so they have no clue how to fix it. I do not feel safe at all driving the vehicle since 98% of my driving is on 50-55 mph roadways. Odds tell the average person with common sense that the next time this happens, I will be doing 55 mph when I lose all ability to steer my vehicle. Service advisors insist that they need it to do it again but after driving it 40 miles, they haven't gotten it to do it. I'm not sure what I'm supposed to do with this unsafe vehicle. I do not plan on being the guinea pig driving it when it does this again. Yes, I'll be able to come to a stop but if I stop in the middle of the highway, I'll get plowed into and someone will be seriously injured if not killed.

Ford seems to be oblivious to this! Are they really suggesting that I drive it until it does it again, cross my fingers that I'm not killed and that codes will actually record this time? I'm so incredibly disappointed.

Has anyone else experienced this? Looking for a solution!
 



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Get ready to be banished to a thread with about 1,000 posts about this issue. Happy reading!
 












See issue with 2011-2014 models

Thanks, swshawaii. I've been reading the same issue with the 2011-2014 models. Didn't know if people were experiencing the same thing with the 2016s. I'm so incredibly disappointed in Ford. Wishing I'd never traded my Edge in for this Explorer. They obviously have buried their heads in the sand because they don't know what the problem is :(
 






Welcome to the Forum mwaller1027. :wavey:
Ford maintains that when this occurs, the driver will still have steering control albeit with much more effort.
The thread reference in the post above for model 2011 - 2014 Explorers does not seem to have any reported issues to date for any 2015 or 2016 models, at least not in the 12 or so pages I went back through. I therefore amended the subject of this thread for reports on 2015 - 2016 models only.
I strongly urge you to file a report with the NHTSA; https://www-odi.nhtsa.dot.gov/VehicleComplaint/

Peter
 






Get ready to be banished to a thread with about 1,000 posts about this issue. Happy reading!
"Banished" is a bit strong, don't you think. Threads are 'moved' or 'merged' when appropriate.;)

Peter
 






This one is scary! Are there any reported issues with people having this issue at highway speeds (2016 or otherwise)?
 






This one is scary! Are there any reported issues with people having this issue at highway speeds (2016 or otherwise)?
I believe the answer is YES but this thread is the only report of a 2016 issue. Check out the link in post 3 for more info on the 2011 - 2014 models.

Peter
 






There have not been widespread reports of 2016 steering problems.

The situation you described certainly is a failure of the system.

It does need to be looked at by a dealer, and Ford did the right thing by offering to tow your vehicle to the nearest dealership to be diagnosed. Yeah, it sucks that the timing wasn't great, but they did what they were obligated to do.

It sounds like there may have been more going on than just the steering if the dash "lit up like Times Square". At least it should leave some codes for them to read.
 






No codes

It left absolutely no codes, which is now where the problem lies. They don't have a clue what to do and are telling me they need it to do it again and cross our fingers that a code comes up. They're currently driving it a very small amount of time to see if it will do it again. Pretty soon they're just going to insist on me picking it up I'm afraid. I fear that I will be stuck driving a vehicle that isn't safe since they don't have a clue what to repair.
 






I've learned that anytime I get an error message on my vehicle (Ford or not) I will (if at all possible) take a photo of it so that in the event that the error(s) isn't recorded I can show them.... Good luck and sorry this is on a 16...
 






I totally empathize with you with regards to the codes as I have hit the same wall. Dealers tend to just wash it away and I started running the Ford Diagnostics when the error message happens to show them a copy of what happened. I understand that my preceding statement will be of no help to your present situation.
Why would a failure code be reset by turning off the car and restarting it? Isn't the point of error codes to allow debugging of the issue. Bad Design!
 






So what does "the dash lit up like Times Square" mean?

When my power steering failed, it just gave me a warning message in the left display.

What were some of the other messages?

Sounds like something more than the power steering failed.
 






Dash lit up as stated in the original post by repeatedly showing errors in the left section of the dash. The three errors are listed in the original post as well:
1. Terrain Management System Fault
2. Service Advance Trak
3. Hill Assist Error
Even when pressing OK to acknowledge and clear the message on the dash, they would continue to pop on the screen one after the other.

I don't believe it is a problem with the power steering system but a computer failure/glitch. Doesn't seem to be any known fix even after all the similar issues with the 2011-2014 models.
 






It's also a very good possibility on bad/loose connection somewhere. Could be ground for power steering, could be one of the pin in the plug that goes to power steering.
 






Test that battery before getting too far in. I've seen more than a few bad Motorcraft batteries right out of the gate. That symptom seems to be indicative of an electrical fault as others have said. I would put a small sum on a bad cell.
 






you need to go to a Ford dealer and have it looked at. Its really hard to steer a vehicle at lower speed compared to higher speeds, some sports cars remove all assist at higher speeds on purpose. You should tell the the dealer if you had to restart the vehicle or did it just lose power steering, let us know if they have an update. If not try another dealer. If you still don't have an answer call Ford customer relations and tell them everything you wrote on here.


Two weeks ago my 4 month old 2016 Ford Explorer completely lost power steering after the dashboard lit up like Times Square with multiple repeated faults and error messages. We had just entered a parking garage, proceeded about two car lengths past a speed bump (over which we had proceeded at about 3 mph), started to turn left and the steering wheel just froze! While in motion, I was not able to steer my vehicle. The wheel did not lock into place like with a click or such. It would move about a 1/2" to the right and 1/2" to the left but would not turn the wheels at all. I could move forward or reverse but only straight in front or behind. This meant I had to inch up to the car parked directly in front of me so that other incoming traffic could squeeze by. Only other option was to back up into a concrete pillar. After several minutes of cycling the key on and off, the steering would not return. I continued to receive the following faults/errors over and over:
Terrain Management System Fault
Service AdvanceTrac
Hill Assist Fault
After 30 minutes on the phone with Ford Roadside Assistance, who was proposing to tow my car to the nearest dealership and leave myself, my hubby and two young children stranded for the remainder of the weekend 2-1/2 hours from home, the darn thing finally freed up. At 2 a.m. we proceeded to drive very slowly, white knuckled all the way back home and did the same Monday morning in getting it to our local dealer.

They have had it for two weeks now and of course, none of the 30+ errors/faults ever recorded on the vehicle, so they have no clue how to fix it. I do not feel safe at all driving the vehicle since 98% of my driving is on 50-55 mph roadways. Odds tell the average person with common sense that the next time this happens, I will be doing 55 mph when I lose all ability to steer my vehicle. Service advisors insist that they need it to do it again but after driving it 40 miles, they haven't gotten it to do it. I'm not sure what I'm supposed to do with this unsafe vehicle. I do not plan on being the guinea pig driving it when it does this again. Yes, I'll be able to come to a stop but if I stop in the middle of the highway, I'll get plowed into and someone will be seriously injured if not killed.

Ford seems to be oblivious to this! Are they really suggesting that I drive it until it does it again, cross my fingers that I'm not killed and that codes will actually record this time? I'm so incredibly disappointed.

Has anyone else experienced this? Looking for a solution!
 






you need to go to a Ford dealer and have it looked at. Its really hard to steer a vehicle at lower speed compared to higher speeds, some sports cars remove all assist at higher speeds on purpose. You should tell the the dealer if you had to restart the vehicle or did it just lose power steering, let us know if they have an update. If not try another dealer. If you still don't have an answer call Ford customer relations and tell them everything you wrote on here.
They did. Their post describes what happened.

Test that battery before getting too far in. I've seen more than a few bad Motorcraft batteries right out of the gate. That symptom seems to be indicative of an electrical fault as others have said. I would put a small sum on a bad cell.
I'm with you. I was thinking bad battery, loose terminal connection, something like that.

When my 2011 (not my current 2016) went into power sterring failure, it was on startup, and it was just the single error. Multiple errors like that sound like something electronic losing its mind.
 






Two weeks ago my 4 month old 2016 Ford Explorer completely lost power steering after the dashboard lit up like Times Square with multiple repeated faults and error messages. We had just entered a parking garage, proceeded about two car lengths past a speed bump (over which we had proceeded at about 3 mph), started to turn left and the steering wheel just froze! While in motion, I was not able to steer my vehicle. The wheel did not lock into place like with a click or such. It would move about a 1/2" to the right and 1/2" to the left but would not turn the wheels at all. I could move forward or reverse but only straight in front or behind. This meant I had to inch up to the car parked directly in front of me so that other incoming traffic could squeeze by. Only other option was to back up into a concrete pillar. After several minutes of cycling the key on and off, the steering would not return. I continued to receive the following faults/errors over and over:
Terrain Management System Fault
Service AdvanceTrac
Hill Assist Fault
After 30 minutes on the phone with Ford Roadside Assistance, who was proposing to tow my car to the nearest dealership and leave myself, my hubby and two young children stranded for the remainder of the weekend 2-1/2 hours from home, the darn thing finally freed up. At 2 a.m. we proceeded to drive very slowly, white knuckled all the way back home and did the same Monday morning in getting it to our local dealer.

They have had it for two weeks now and of course, none of the 30+ errors/faults ever recorded on the vehicle, so they have no clue how to fix it. I do not feel safe at all driving the vehicle since 98% of my driving is on 50-55 mph roadways. Odds tell the average person with common sense that the next time this happens, I will be doing 55 mph when I lose all ability to steer my vehicle. Service advisors insist that they need it to do it again but after driving it 40 miles, they haven't gotten it to do it. I'm not sure what I'm supposed to do with this unsafe vehicle. I do not plan on being the guinea pig driving it when it does this again. Yes, I'll be able to come to a stop but if I stop in the middle of the highway, I'll get plowed into and someone will be seriously injured if not killed.

Ford seems to be oblivious to this! Are they really suggesting that I drive it until it does it again, cross my fingers that I'm not killed and that codes will actually record this time? I'm so incredibly disappointed.

Has anyone else experienced this? Looking for a solution!

This happened on my 2011 twice. Here is a link to the recall on my Explorer: 2011 FORD EXPLORER | Safercar | National Highway Traffic Safety Administration (NHTSA)
 



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Two weeks ago my 4 month old 2016 Ford Explorer completely lost power steering after the dashboard lit up like Times Square with multiple repeated faults and error messages. We had just entered a parking garage, proceeded about two car lengths past a speed bump (over which we had proceeded at about 3 mph), started to turn left and the steering wheel just froze! While in motion, I was not able to steer my vehicle. The wheel did not lock into place like with a click or such. It would move about a 1/2" to the right and 1/2" to the left but would not turn the wheels at all. I could move forward or reverse but only straight in front or behind. This meant I had to inch up to the car parked directly in front of me so that other incoming traffic could squeeze by. Only other option was to back up into a concrete pillar. After several minutes of cycling the key on and off, the steering would not return. I continued to receive the following faults/errors over and over:
Terrain Management System Fault
Service AdvanceTrac
Hill Assist Fault
After 30 minutes on the phone with Ford Roadside Assistance, who was proposing to tow my car to the nearest dealership and leave myself, my hubby and two young children stranded for the remainder of the weekend 2-1/2 hours from home, the darn thing finally freed up. At 2 a.m. we proceeded to drive very slowly, white knuckled all the way back home and did the same Monday morning in getting it to our local dealer.

They have had it for two weeks now and of course, none of the 30+ errors/faults ever recorded on the vehicle, so they have no clue how to fix it. I do not feel safe at all driving the vehicle since 98% of my driving is on 50-55 mph roadways. Odds tell the average person with common sense that the next time this happens, I will be doing 55 mph when I lose all ability to steer my vehicle. Service advisors insist that they need it to do it again but after driving it 40 miles, they haven't gotten it to do it. I'm not sure what I'm supposed to do with this unsafe vehicle. I do not plan on being the guinea pig driving it when it does this again. Yes, I'll be able to come to a stop but if I stop in the middle of the highway, I'll get plowed into and someone will be seriously injured if not killed.

Ford seems to be oblivious to this! Are they really suggesting that I drive it until it does it again, cross my fingers that I'm not killed and that codes will actually record this time? I'm so incredibly disappointed.

Has anyone else experienced this? Looking for a solution!


I experienced exactly the same thing while on the freeway on my 2016 Ford Explorer 2.3. The dash read Hill Start Assist Not Available, Service Advance Trac, steering loss stop safely, hill. I was able to bring it home and called the dealer the next day. My appointment to bring the vehicle is 2 weeks later. With much difficulty, I was able to bring it to the dealer without need for towing. It is still set for diagnosis. I was just wondering if and how your steering issue was resolved. Will appreciate your reply. Thanks.
 






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