@@user-tb7rn1il3q the issue with that is that millions of Americans don’t live within walking distance of a bus line that goes to their destination, or a bus line at all. Our public transport needs wayyyy more work if we want to limit people’s access away from cars in a car centric country
@@aydenu9057 No, people need to buy and demand cheaper cars. Easy lending has made cars expensive. Most places in the US have some public transportation.
You picked my first guess with your first choice. I recall how proud GM/Cadillac was of their Northstar engine. It’s amazing how much effort they put into a piece of eventual junk.
@stock.wheel.shawty Or bc they're not as bad as ppl say. There was more say Nissan Sentras produced than cadillacs but you still see more Northstar powered cadillacs than old Nissan Sentras.
You can partially thank the customers for that, since most of them treated it like a run-of-the-mill GM sedan, instead of the European Luxury standards that it was supposed to be kept at. It's also on GM for not marketing it appropriately, and selling it to people who couldn't afford the meticulous maintenance on the damn thing. Those remaining ones out there have had TONS of money put into them. Ask me how I know lol.....
I had a 2013 Focus with a 5 speed manual, the transmission made a significant difference. Sold it to one of the national online dealers (sounds like nirvana) , the truck driver couldn’t operate a manual so I had to put it on the truck for him. Too bad manuals are going away they solve problems and improve the driving experience.
I have a 2014 Focus SE hatchback with the 5 speed manual. I've had a few minor problems: the horn sometimes doesn't work, I had to replace to coolant reservoir, and the steering wheel padding is degrading a bit. Otherwise it's a great driving car. It has decent pickup when accelerating. It's handling in turns is amazing. Absolutely no problems with the engine, clutch or transmission.
We need more of these videos.. I've seen so many people get ripped off by purchasing the Caddy Northstar and they just didn't do the research. But having video's like these that will come up higher in youtube will help them save some money. Great content!!
Northstar engines after ~2004 allegedly had the headgasket issues fixed. So if you see a Northstar from ~2005 they probably don't have that issue. Since the headgasket issue was the most common issue, I can't really say about the other issues. As for the Audi AllRoad, the 2.7 twin turbo V6 is difficult to work on, I've heard. And you're going to have to work on it quite a lot, it's an Audi engine.
Yes, its usually specific years of whatever model you are talking about. Usually if a manufacturer is having major failures the revise the parts that are causing them.
Yes...Northstar engines after 2005 don't have the gasket issues the pre-2005 engines had. And one would think the pre-2005 engines have had their gaskets replaced with the newer ones. Unfortunately, the stink already exists on these engines and it will take a couple more generations to pass before they become a memory.
The RWD Northstars (XLR, 2004+) is a fantastic engine. Thread pitch in the blocks were changed to a more coarse pitch and head gasket issue were largely left behind. My '04 has been trouble-free.
Gm with 3.6 was a favorite as a service writer. Stretched timing chains, oil burning, direct injection clogging water pump eating pos. Transmission wave plate eater. Made tons of money. Thanks for such a great vehicle.
The issues with the 3.6 were resolved around the 2015 model year. Aside from a known issue with the purge valve solenoid, the 3.6 is just fine with proper oil changes. Also important to change transmission fluid at 60,000 miles and then every 30,000 miles after that.
I've noticed working in the auto auction world that the 3.6 isn't really the problem, it's the owners. Pretty much every single Impala,terrain,traverse etc was absolutely beat on and had virtually no maintenance.
Water pump and transmission had special coverage for a reason. Yes, most were beat. I worked in a gmc dealership, so I saw the nicer well maintained vehicles.
I’m always so astounded by the timing chain issues the 3.6 had. When I was a wee lad we had a CTS for 14 years. We had it from 3k miles to 230k with not a single check engine light due to mechanical parts. Always electrical or sensor related. Don’t think it’s oil changes we’re always done on time either.
This is true. I have a 1996 honda accord and you can solve just about every issue because the service manuals and wiring diagrams are actually available to look at online. It's almost as if companies actually took pride in their products back then.
Another problem with the Northstar engine is prior to 2002, they were using steel bolts on an aluminum chassis which overtime would create general leaks in the engine besides the one covered here.
The engine used in the second generation Mini was developed with PSA Peugeot Citroen known as the Prince Engine. It was used in various cars in the PSA range as well. I had a Peugeot 308 (same size car as the Focus and Golf) with the non turbo version of this Engine, this was the only car I've ever had to top up the Engine with Oil between services, I've always regularly checked the oil level but this Engine would always go into limp home mode after a long journey, being told that it's normal for the Engine to do this, I was glad to get rid of this car.
It BOGGLES my mind how they went from such a great engine with the Tritec to such an AWFUL engine with the Prince. Not only do the high pressure fuel pumps fail rapidly but the low pressure ones will try to pick up the slack and run harder 24/7 and go bad if the owner keeps rying to run it with a bad high pressure pump and on THREE separate cases I've seen the wires that go through the low pressure pump's assembly literally burned and that is in the FUEL TANK. Super dangerous. I've replaced so many high pressure fuel pumps and turbos on the 07+ Mini's but I've done ZERO major work on the Tritec engines which I've done many many more of than the Prince. They also give you zero room to work on the Prince engines, even the N/A's, the pulleys and accessories are literally just a few milimeters from the frame and it's such a time consuming job, especially on an engine where the water pump and the water pump pulley fail regularly, the pulley system for the serpentine belt is also terrible. Meanwhile the Tritec engines are a little tight but very doable, even on the supercharged models. It's also really easy to modify the Tritec's and push a lot more power out of them and cheap, I've built many track R53's, R53's are honestly one of the most fun vehicles you can drive. Their only major issue I can think of is the electric power steering system, it's pretty common for them to develop a leak which will eventually cause you to have zero power steering.
I rented a Nissan versa with 5000 miles and it was the worse transmission I have ever driven. I literally drove it from Jacksonville NC to Wilmington NC. It stalled out on the enterprise representative.
I had two Focuses with that gearbox. 2013 and a 2018. It's so damn disappointing because other than the repeated clutch pack failures and one TCM the car was totally reliable and was a joy to drive.
These transmissions are actually pretty easy to fix. Nowadays, the parts for them are so cheap that it is worth keeping dualclutch for a few more years.
The dual-clutch transmission idea was a neat one, Ford tried to give consumers something more advanced than they would expect from these kinds of cars, unfortunately they weren't able to get them to be reliable. Dual-clutch transmissions generally provide better gas mileage and performance than a standard automatic that uses hydraulic pressure built up manually through the pump driven by the torque converter.
I had a 2013 Fiesta. It had a shudder when shifting while turning from a stop light. I redid the ground connection on the frame to the battery. The bolt on the frame for the ground was painted. Once I did that, never had another issue with the transmission. But the car did decide it wanted to try to be a submarine on hwy 70 right in front of Lambert airport in STL in August of 22. Had 153,000 miles on that car. Thought it was a great car. Just hard to get in and out of being over 6 foot tall. Great gas mileage.
I owned an Audi Allroad that lasted over 400K miles with nothing more than oil changes and tires. Just kidding. But I repair a lot of Audi's and you'll never get a customer to own up that they are a POS. That Caddy either if they bought it new.
Umm Tommy.... No engine likes to be overheated. The problem wasn't that they used torque to yield bolts, those are extremely common. The problem is they speced the head bolts and head gaskets incorrectly.
Counterpoint, while the automatic Ford Focus/Fiestas have serious issues, the manual ones are just fine. And they are cheap because everyone says to avoid them, its just the automatic ones that need to be avoided.
Great point. The manual made the Fiesta somewhat fun to drive too. I took one to 314K miles. Same scenario w/ Nissan and their CVT's. A Sentra w/ 6-speed manual can be good for drama-free 200K+ miles w/ just basic maintenance once you take away the transmission issues.
A buddy of mine was a Ford mechanic and he bought a brand new Focus for a steal because of the notorious transmission problems. He was a special case, because he knew how to fix these transmissions really fast and easy due to the high volume of these cars arriving at the shop. So it wasn’t really much for him to fix it when it inevitably failed lol.
I don't think the Northstar was over engineered it was underdeveloped per GM's usual cost cutting and mismanagement. They start from behind then rush to production as cheap as possible. The 4.0 in my Aurora was flawless.
Lost a transmission in my Aurora before the engine. The TCC went out early on and drove it probably 50k miles with no torque convertor lockup... eventually died on a long highway roadtrip.
@Seth Burke 🤣 nice. I had an issue with my radiator after hitting a raccoon the size of a Rottweiler. Kept losing all the coolant and drove on limp home several times. At least a good 30 miles. Gave the car to my little brother. He was rear ended and it was totaled with about 85k on the clock and he still got about $9k from insurance.
My 2014 Dodge Dart Turbo Auto, would randomly shutdown while driving. I had it for 4 months and only drove it for 1 month because it was at the dealer x5+. Chrysler Dodge were awe full and apparently it never replicated while in their stuporvision (yes intentional typo)
If you fix the heater core before it overheats and put new head bolts, these Eldorados are actually really nice cars. Pretty quick and easy on gas too. Nice stability system they look great and you can bypass the air rod. If the airbags are blown. On top of that even a small turbo about 6 to8 psi works wonders on these. Cadillac Eldorado
As some one who works in the Auto parts industry, any vehicle with air suspension will fail. If you have a vehicle with airs suspension and live in an enviroment where you go from one extreme to the other (hot and cold) like in the North it will fail sooner rather than later. Ruber dires out quicker and the bags fail. The pumps fail after about 6-7 years.
I know those Accords had some tranny issues and the subframes all rotted out if you were from an area that salts the roads. We replaced quite a few subframes and trannies in those cars. The last one I sold lol. My half brother's mom wanted his car he had a 99 coupe so we went to the auction and dad for some reason bought 2 of those turds. Sold one to Aaron's mom the other to somebody else. The one we sold to this kid actually was a pretty nice car for an old turd. This was probably 7 years or so ago. A few months after the sale the kids dad shows up with a list of demands. Wanted new tires, windshield, and hood. His kid didn't latch the hood and had it blow up into the windshield. And I don't know what he did but it had a good set of tires on it when I sold it and he had basically burned them right off within a few months. It was an as is sale even if there was a warranty on it, you don't get new tires or glass or hoods because you didn't latch the hood
@@ssjrose9641 - I DON’T abuse my cars. The terrible transmissions are a known fact & Honda was forced to recall the transmissions & warranty them to at least 100,000 miles. The clutches burned up in these transmissions & it had nothing to do with abuse. Honda had piss poor oil jetting on the clutches.
I’ve owned over 35 cars, usually keep around 3-4 in the mix. I can tell you nothing strikes more fear into informed buyers than the BMW E60 550i with N52 engine. It’s the most unsellable car I’ve ever owned.
I currently have a 2015 Focus with the DCT. Overall it is a great car... minus the transmission. One of the other things to look out for on the car is the shuddering of the clutches will make your engine/transmission mounts fail rather quickly. I would love to do a trans swap to the 5 speed manual. There is a minor oil leak from the valve cover but at about 90k miles that's about standard on most cars with Aluminum heads. I am contemplating if I want to replace my clutch pack for the 4th time or just wait for it to completely die on me and get a new car... It's about 1600 to replace the pack and another 800 to replace the mounts...
try this... keep the trans oil cooler.. this help quite a bit.. so add a aftermarket trans oil cooler.. the heat..esp. if you like to drive the car hard and have fun in it.. the extra heat hurts the trans.. also change the trans oil every year..or two.. its pretty cheap to do
@@randellgribben9772 The clutches are dry, so an oil cooler will do nothing for them. I loved my Focus too, but between Ford not honoring the warranty for the TCM, clutch packs, plus the $800 water pump change I mentioned upthread, I'll never own another Ford.
That list is SPOT ON. I used to be a service manager at Carmax and when we would buy these cars in we would immediately write on them NR meaning not worth repairing. After 75k miles they are literally a functioning total loss.
Parents had a Focus with that transmission. They never had a problem with it while they owned it though my Dad would mention stutters and things with it. I never noticed it myself but I didn't daily drive it.
I like those Eldorados. I came close to buying one but I did not fit inside. They have a very low ceiling, even with the seat all the way down. I am 6ft5" and had to cant my head to the side to drive this car. Leg room was also not great.
Any Nissan, except Xterra or Frontier. Any GM made in the last 15 years. Any Stellantis or Fiat Chysler. Any German manufacturer unless it's 30 years or older. EZ PZ
sorry but i dont agree with the allroad problem,i had one for 3 years and i kid you not except oils filters brake pads i never had to change anything,but i do agree that its hard to get near the engine
I didn't have an Allroad, but had a B5 S4 and a C5 A6, both with the 2.7t and the 6 speed manual. Had no issues with either and loved them both. The A6 had an APR tune on it as well. One of my favorite cars ever. I have C7 S6 now with an APR tune and still miss that A6.
I've actually never heard of transmission issues with these but I've seen three blow up due to a snapped timing belt because the job is so expensive owners usually put them off. Hell, two of those 3 were my brother in law who's a self proclaimed Audi mechanic, he kept putting it off on his main AllRoad, snapped, bent valves, he drove his backup and the same week it snapped and bent multiple valves, again. He had just got the air suspension revamped on the first one too. I've never seen one with working air suspension, every single one I've worked on has been converted to coil and I've only ever seen one AllRoad with the 6 speed manual. Those cars are really just "keep up with the maintenance" and they're solid, I'd garner the reason they had any transmission issues was probably lack of servicing, most German cars at the time were touting their "lifetime oil" and it's just marketing BS.
Jaguar only with certain years/models. X300 is bulletproof; 4.2 engined cars are pretty good. 5.0 liter cars are better after 2013. Land Rover is a different story.
Other dishonorable mentions are: Any Chrysler product that was equipped with the 2.7L V6. The main issue was oil sludge and timing chain tensioners that could fail and lead to catastrophic failure. Another one is any Hyundai/Kia model equipped with the Theta II GDI engines, mostly because of rod bearing failures. I've heard that most machine shops will not touch those engines due to the high failure rates.
Other ones are chevy cruze and equinox. Notorious for oil consumption problems and cooling system components failing and many more problems. Also any hyundai or kia with an engine because they burn oil like crazy go to any dealer and you'll see a 85% of cars there getting new engine installed for oil consumption issues
I was hoping they would get the Nissan Altimas with the CVT transmissions as well major failures. Also the GMC Acadia and the Chevy Traverse have overheating problems and transmission issues. Also I wish they would have had the Hyundai's on there with the engine burning oil and catastrophic failures.😊
Had a 2019 Fiesta ST Line with the 6 speed dual clutch. Put 42k miles on it when I traded it in on a 22 Bronco Sport. Had no issues with the transmission or the car itself. Kinda miss it actually
I currently have a 2014 ford focus with 122000 miles. Ever since I bought the car it’s had problems and now the transmission needs to be replaced due to the tcm failure and the gears are dull. Luckily I’m able to a new car soon! If your looking for a car please don’t ever get a ford focus!
My wife had 2 2011 Fiestas, the first one was recalled as a lemon, the second got either a transmission reflash or a new clutch pack every 10-12k miles since new. We went in 8-9 times or that during our ownership. HORRIBLE car.
My mom had a 2013 Focus. Went through 3 clutch packs in the time she owned it. On the fourth one they told her they wouldn't cover it under warranty anymore so she traded it for a Kia Optima.
@Gary Dudra she had the first one before we met and the second when I met her. She loved the car, but it took that long with me begging her and showing her new car after new car to get her to finally get rid of it.
@@dodgert9034 not because I work at Ford that I know how horrendous they are as automobiles but as a car guy I can't imagine ever owning one or having one in the family. They're just that bad
Northstars deserve all the criticism they get for the head bolt problems, but the cars were great otherwise. After 2004, the problems were resolved... Northstars went on to be installed in XLRs, DTS's, STS's until 2011 largely without issue. They even made a supercharged version (4.4 liter) for the XLR-V and STS-V that produced 440- 469 HP and were/remain solid, reliable engines.
Ugh! The Mini Cooper is such a lame car. Too bad people who never read Consumer Reports (or car reliability reviews in general) were suckered into buying the POS cars.
They just said Ford had these transmissions from 2011 to 2016. Would that mean the 2017 and 18 Focuses (Auto) are okay to buy or was that just a mistake?
I’m surprised there was no mention of Theta engine equipped Hyundai and Kia models. Let’s not even talk about the base model ones that the insurance companies don’t like!
My Mother has a 99 Cadillac with a Northstar has almost 100,000 mi on it or does and she has zero issues out of it. And gets good fuel mileage out of it.
Ironically enough, the video opens with them walking by a YF Hyundai Sonata. Those should also be avoided, especially if it has the 2.4L GDi engine. They are a disaster and also subject to a massive recall/campaign. Those engines are so bad that even engine rebuilders won't touch them. Hyundai ended up warrantying tgem "for life", but only under specific terms and even then they don't always grant a replacement. Countless stories online of owners being denied a replacement due to lack of service history or other factors.
Those Ford Focuses are a sad case of one flaw dooming the reputation of an otherwise great car. Everything around the transmissions in those cars is excellent
My dad's 2004 sts had 320k miles on it. Replaced water pump twice but that was it. Didn't burn oil, didn't have any real problems, of course us kids even hot rodded and raced everyone that would race us in that thing. It was pretty bullet proof except that water pump. Maybe they had a lot of things fixed by 2004.
Our son & daughter-in-law had one of those Cadillac Northstar engines, it trashed on them, they sold parts off of the car, made a few $$ to ease the pain. My wife’s Nephew had one of those Ford Focuses with the bad tranny. He had bought it brand new, the dealership bought it back for what he gave for it. Thanks for showing us the lemons to avoid. I like lemonade that’s made with lemons grown on trees, not lemon cars. Great job y’all keep’m coming
I had a 2013 Fiesta. It had a shudder when shifting while turning from a stop light. I redid the ground connection on the frame to the battery. The bolt on the frame for the ground was painted. Once I did that, never had another issue with the transmission. But the car did decide it wanted to try to be a submarine on hwy 70 right in front of Lambert airport in STL in August of 22. Had 153,000 miles on that car. Thought it was a great car. Just hard to get in and out of being over 6 foot tall. Great gas mileage.
Also, easing on the accelerator from a stop in those low gears does away with the shuddering entirely. As my mechanic buddy says, "we ain't in a rush".
If you put on an aftermarket water pump thats better than factory, put on some new headbolts that are longer and aren't torque to yield, and those Northstars will last a while. I had a 2007 Buick Lucerne cxs and it had 189,000 miles on it and it leaked oil like a mother trucker but it just needed one new gasket and some other things replaced but after she was damn near bulletproof. For 3,000ish bucks you can have a pretty reliable car that gets close to 30mpg at 80
As a MINI aficionado, the 11+ Cooper S is a VAST improvement over the early second generation. All the issues are minimized, if not gone. The third generation is actually.. reliable!
The Northstar was the last of Cadillac's run of really bad engines that started with the V8-6-4 and HT4100. They sold a lot of imports, and a lot of Buicks with 3800 V6s.
I've got a manual 2011 Fiesta. Man am I happy about that transmission. I've had my car for 5 years. It's been unbelievably reliable. I've had zero major problems.
And a good thing about manual trans missions is theft Proof Because a lot of people do not know how to drive manual transmission. That's a good thing about Owning one 😎
I've got 75,000 miles on my 2016 Fiesta ST with no problems. It was my first brand new car. Make sure your transmission is filled to the proper capacity, Ford underfilled the ST transmissions.
@@ae747sp5 Many thousnads of Chevy Impalas and Monte Carlos, and Pontiac Grand Prixs would disagree with that statement as they rev up their 5.3 LS motors.
LS would probably fit, though not sure how well that 4T65E is going to handle LS power. 2GR out of a Camry might be too tall even if that engine compartment fits a DOHC V8. The 2GR is also going to match the power output of the 300hp Northstar haha
Lol. I have an 2004 A6 2.7t And love it. Easy t9 work on, easy to move the front bumper cover fwd. Runs at 130mph feeling like 55mph. Solid as a rock. Easy to coax much more HP out of too. Well made car!
