- Some owners of older Ford and Mazda vehicles have been asked to stop driving their vehicles
- Specifically, the warning applies to the almost 250,000 vehicles in Canada with unreplaced Takata airbags
- The recall on the dangerous airbags is years old, and parts are immediately available for the repair
The fallout from hazardous Takata airbag inflators continues apace, many years after the issue first reared its ugly and dangerous head. This time, legal types from Ford and Mazda are warning owners of certain models with the bad ‘bags to park their vehicles and stop driving them — all in the name of safety.
At issue are roughly 160,900 Ford vehicles and 71,000 Mazda vehicles in Canada, vehicles which have not seen some of the numerous recalls associated with the Takata airbag fiasco yet completed. In explaining the problem, Mazda says the age of these vehicles, some of which are over 20 years old, makes it increasingly possible the airbag inflators could explode and cause sharp metal fragments to strike the driver or passengers. That’s a good time for precisely no one, and turns these unrepaired recalled cars into ticking time-bombs.
Sticking with Mazda for a moment, the company has identified the following machines under the net of this do-not-drive order:
- 2004 through 2010 Mazda B-series pickup trucks;
- 2004 through 2011 Mazda RX-8 sports cars;
- 2004 through 2013 Mazda6 sedans (plus the couple of Mazdaspeed6 years);
- 2007 through 2012 Mazda CX-7 SUVs; and
- 2007 through 2015 Mazda CX-9 SUVs
On some models, both the driver and passenger airbag inflators may be affected, while on others the recall is just for the passenger side.
Alert readers will recognize this as an era in which Ford and Mazda shared much in terms of engineering, which is why there are a raft of Blue Oval machines also under the spell of this order. They include:
- 2004 through 2011 Ford Ranger pickups;
- 2005 through 2014 Ford Mustang pony cars;
- 2005 and 2006 Ford GT supercars;
- 2006 through 2012 Ford Fusion and variants; and
- 2007 through 2010 Ford Edge SUV and variants
Like the Mazdas, some are included for driver and passenger airbag parts, whilst others are just on the passenger side.
Parts are apparently available right now at both Mazda and Ford dealers, with the latter suggesting owners can even take advantage of a mobile service that will come to them, given the do-not-drive order and all. Ford is also promising a free loaner vehicle — a machine which will likely be several orders of magnitude newer than the one being repaired, ironically.
We idly wonder how many of these machines are languishing in recycling centres or mouldering away in someone’s backyard, given the age of the things. Sure, owners are supposed to notify Big Brother when a vehicle is destroyed, but we all know of more than a few which simply vanish off the books. A cursory and very unscientific poll at Kenny-U-Pull shows nearly 200 Ranger trucks in its yards across Canada — and that’s just one recycler amongst thousands.
Ford and Mazda aren’t the only brands dealing with Takata trouble. Transport Canada has a full list of affected models, with 140 entries. Major recalls started a decade ago, with smaller campaigns nearly stretching all the way back to when we were all talking about the Y2K bug.
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