We bought this car '08 Ford Explorer XLT in 2009 from a dealership. We didn't have it very long, I'll say 3 years and I noticed it starting to clunk when I put it in reverse plus it hesitated when you would put it in reverse like the tranny didn't know what gear it wanted to get in then the clunk happened.

I took it to a tranny rebuild shop they put diagnostic tool on it and the guy said they couldn't find anything wrong with it, this happened while it was still under extended warranty. I just let it go but in time it got worse. I took it to a guy who I trusted, he drove it and he told me to a "T" what was wrong with it, meantime the extended warranty ran out so I was out almost $1900 to completely re-build tranny. He said this tranny was a bad design from Ford. He bored out the hole (I guessing the shaft) in the housing and put in a better heavy duty bushing.

He said these holes get wallored out because of the wear and tear of use. This fixed the problem until my wife came home from work and told me about another problem, 3 weeks ago. The tranny would lurch forward when coming to a stop or slowing down I thought the brakes, so, I took the car to AutoZone and the gal put a diagnostic tool on it, it read solenoid pack was bad. I took car to the same tranny guy and he said the solenoid pack was bad, result of a poor designed condensation drain leaking water down onto the wiring harness on tranny thus shorting out solenoid pack inside tranny.

This cost me $358 to replace. He didn't charge me any labor because of the 2 year warranty he gave me the first time. The warranty I'm talking about just ran out in June this past summer. I've had all American brand of vehicles in the past and all I've had is problems with torque converters, tranny's going out, I told my wife, we have had our last American brand of vehicles.

I have an '03 Toyota Tundra now no problems except wear and tear on pressure plate, clutch etc which was replaced 3 years ago. From now on we are buying Toyota or Honda vehicles. I hate to say this about American vehicles and workers, but I think America has lost their edge on quality and workmanship, sad! 12/31/15

I bought a used 2008 Explorer in April of 2014. It ran pretty good until I decided to take it on a long distance trip from Kentucky to North Carolina in August of that same year in order to attend my brother's Military Retirement Ceremony. After completing the trip, my Explorer's transmission decided it no longer wanted to work at just 117,000 miles, effectively leaving me stranded about miles from home.

I did a lot of research and went to a few different garages, including the local Ford dealer, before I really figured out what had happened. Apparently Ford manufactures these transmissions with a poor design that allows the shift pin to rub right against the aluminium until it wears out a giant oval and slips out of place. In my case this cascaded into a small series of events that caused one of the snap rings to break and then become a lathe, causing the damage featured in the picture I uploaded.

As it turns out, Ford happens to be completely aware of this crap and refuses to fix the problem or recall any vehicles affected by it. In fact, if you take your vehicle to Ford, they will replace the transmission with another that has the same defect and will last around 60,000 to 120,000 miles. The transmission shop I went to was well aware of this issue, having fixed several, and knew of several aftermarket kits designed to fix it permanently.

The reason this is particularly infuriating to me is that Ford could reasonably address this issue, but instead they compound it. They clearly lack respect for their customers. Due to their sloppiness and disrespect, I ended up shelling out around $3600 in total for a hotel room for the week (plus food) and the new transmission. Needless to say, I will NEVER buy another Ford, period.

This is my 3rd Explorer, and the first to have major problems. Driving on highway, transmission doesn't shift from 55 Mph to 63 mph, then it finally shifts and a smooth ride at 70 mph. Brought it right in and dealer states two different issues with the transmission, bottom line, needs replacing. Vehicle is well cared for with only 106,000 miles, mostly highway miles. Price quote is ridiculous at $4600. Researching I'm learning that this has been a common issue with the Explorers but no recalls. No transmission should need to be replaced with just over 100,000 miles.

If anyone has had this problem and a better solution, I'd appreciate the input.

DebNH

This 2008 Ford Explorer with 98,000 miles had a complete transmission failure in city traffic. The car would not move, and had to be put in reverse against the following line of traffic to get the car to move off the street. This happened as I was going to pickup a loaner for my 2002 Ford Explorer that was in the dealership for the replacement of its transmission, which also had just failed several days earlier. Ford Explorer clearly has a major problem with unprecedented rates of transmission failure in multiple model years. I want to join a class action suit to receive damages if I can find one. Please advise if there is such litigation ongoing somewhere. Thank you. Kathy Labrum