Had just gotten onto highway going about 45 mph, changed lanes to accelerate and felt like a tire blew out, heard something dragging, luckily exited off quickly pulled over to find that rear axel had broke and both tires were on their way to caving in. No accident or injury-thank god. Called Ford dealership and was told no recalls on axles and this was a "common occurrence."

- Reading, MA, USA

On or about December 15, 2007 my husband noticed when he hit a bump in the road the rear end of our 2001 Ford Windstar LX felt loose. We thought the shocks were starting to ware. On December 20, 2007 my husband started on his way home from work around 3:30 pm he headed South on I55 out of Chicago and reached our driveway in the southwest suburbs approximately 5:00 pm. At 5:30 P. our family with two children got into the van to go christmas shopping. As we were pulling out of the driveway the van jerked and screeched. We thought we hit someone that had parked behind us. We jumped out to see what happened and noticed our rear tires looked funny and the back end was really low. When we looked under it we saw that the axle was broken in two. It had just snapped. If this had happened a half hour earlier this would have happened on the expressway in rush hour traffic and I hate to think what would have happened, or 15 minutes later when we were on I355 going christmas shopping with our children. We were more than happy to have this happen in our driveway but this is our only vehicle and we don't have the $1000 it will cost to replace the part. The van is no longer under warranty, it has 72,915 miles on it. How inconvenient!

- Bolingbrook, IL, USA

On October 19, 2007 I backed out of my driveway, shifted into drive and began to go forward when I felt an alarming sensation in my car. I pulled over to the side of the road to inspect my tires. All looked fine so I returned to my car, shifted into drive again and began to go forward when I felt the rear of the car sway. I pulled over again and looked under the back of the car when I saw that my rear axel has snapped in two. On the day of the event my car had 65,700 miles on the odometer. I had my car towed to a local mechanic in wakefield, mass. Both the tow truck driver and the mechanic seperately told me this was shocking and not something that should happen to a car. After analyzing my car the mechanic determined that the broken axel was a manufacturer defect. There is a clean break in the axel where the two broken parts fit together snug like a puzzle. There is no evidence of an accident or tampering to the axel. The mechanic showed me where there is a part of the axel where water can get in, but there is no way for the water to escape. As a result the axel rusted from the inside until it weakened and broke. My mechanic has photographed this part and is holding it at his garage for inspection. As an aside, I have also contacted the owner of stoneham Ford, mark melkonian, to report the problem. He looked up my service account and verified I have "been faithful in the maintanence schedule." I, like my mechanic, believe this is a serious issue in which other consumers will soon, if not already, experience an axel break. Had the axel given when I was on the highway with my children in the vehicle, the outcome might have been much more severe. I am afraid if this is not reviewed another family may have a critical outcome in the course of the axel giving way. Could you please advise what I need to do to have someone look at this part of the car and how it simply cracked in two.

- Stoneham, MA, USA