Sounds like a ’94 Chrysler I once had, it was a completely new platform, LHS, I think I must have gotten one of the first off the line, it was constantly in the shop for some recall or repair. A few years later it was a really nice and reliable (so I thought) car.
In ’02 the explorer was completely redone much, very close if not a complete redo of the platform. In ’03 it seems from this forum is much cleaner but still has a few problems. The ’04 not much going on mostly problem free.
Just out of curiosity what’s the build date and plant location?
IMHO Part of the problem is it’s not uncommon for the any auto company to just request a 5% reduction in cost from a part supplier, who then takes shortcuts to make end meet; then another scenario is they find another supplier who offers 8% cut in cost, so they ax the first supplier, one of X years, for the cheaper guy. The manager saves money and looks good, gets the promotion but we pay the price for poor parts. that’s why one year will be good with one part and bad for another, although it sounds like you’re being bitten by the First model year syndrome
