Reliability study shows EcoBoost 3.5L V6 on top

[JCsTruck]

It was a play on words, AKA click bait. Looks like it worked! ?

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[Steverinofla]

I'm kind of surprised but also not in a way. The article does point out that Ford produces so many trucks that there will naturally be more of them for sale in the used market. The 3.5 has been out longer than the 2.7 and has always been pushed by Ford as its flagship engine for the fleet.

They also mention that they weren't going to go into the service history of all 1 million vehicles they sampled to see what sort of repairs these engines had. The Internet is full of negative comments on every engine to some extent so all we can really go on is personal experience. I owned a 1st gen 3.5 for 13 years and had no major issues with it after 93k miles and that's all I can really go by.

The question is: Is the engine data normalized?

 

[Pelican]

The question is: Is the engine data normalized?

What does normalized mean?

 

[Steverinofla]

"Normalization of ratings means adjusting values measured on different scales to a notionally common scale, often prior to averaging."
The fact that there are so many more EB engines will skew a percentage study UNLESS the data is adjusted (normalized) to take the huge number of EB engines into account.

 

[Daiwa300]

"Normalization of ratings means adjusting values measured on different scales to a notionally common scale, often prior to averaging."
The fact that there are so many more EB engines will skew a percentage study UNLESS the data is adjusted (normalized) to take the huge number of EB engines into account.

There was no attempt to account for differences in initial sales volumes. The “study” is based on a set of sample counts and tells nothing about relative reliability.

The 3.5 Ecoboost represented 15.6% of a sample of engines with 150,000+ miles on them. The article concludes that because the engine has the highest “share”, it is the most reliable.

The data don’t support this conclusion. Let’s imagine, for example, that 3.5 Ecoboost engines made up 50% of the 0 mile set of the engines tracked. In this case, it might be that the engine had the lowest survival rate (the article’s proxy for “reliability”). Conversely, if the engine represented 5% of the 0 mile set, it might be the most reliable by far.

Without the 0 mile data, no conclusions about relative survival rates (“reliability”) can be made.

 

[PowerBoostSoCal]

Say what you will about the 3.5 and 2.7 EcoBoost engines - they had teething problems in the beginning, BUT NOTHING like what Toyota and GM are having with their engines. Bearings, poor design, oil specs that may be too light and on and on ... there are comments about Ford quality and especially recalls, but really not much about their engines. From my perspective, most of the issues stem from poor or lack of maintenance. I've had FOUR EB engines in F150s over the past 12 years - all run over 100K miles before trade and honestly other than silly recalls for review cameras and a few other things - NOTHING engine related. I think the EB is a solid platform!

 

[tsigwing]

Say what you will about the 3.5 and 2.7 EcoBoost engines - they had teething problems in the beginning, BUT NOTHING like what Toyota and GM are having with their engines. Bearings, poor design, oil specs that may be too light and on and on ... there are comments about Ford quality and especially recalls, but really not much about their engines. From my perspective, most of the issues stem from poor or lack of maintenance. I've had FOUR EB engines in F150s over the past 12 years - all run over 100K miles before trade and honestly other than silly recalls for review cameras and a few other things - NOTHING engine related. I think the EB is a solid platform!

and those were? I bought the first year for the 2.7L in 2015, and boy the nay sayers on the F150 forums at that time. Never had any issues with that truck. How the times have changed.

 

[Goldeneye36]

and those were? I bought the first year for the 2.7L in 2015, and boy the nay sayers on the F150 forums at that time. Never had any issues with that truck. How the times have changed.

I got sucked in by Ford's Ecoboost Torture Test series and bought a 3.5L in 2011 pretty much the week they hit the lot, lol. Never had an issue with the drivetrain on that truck over 13 years of ownership and everything else I was able to fix in my driveway. Most of the sentiment I heard around that time was more of the old-school "it has to have a V8 or it's not a real truck" mentality.

I've always heard almost universally positive sentiment about the 2.7L. Maybe some concerns about the oil pump belt but I haven't seen any instances of those failing yet. The 3.5L got a poor reputation on the Internet due to cam phasers, valve covers, and manifolds cracking, among other things but those seem to be mostly prevalent in the 2nd gen 3.5. There are so many of those trucks on the road though that the vast majority are probably not having issues.

 

[JExpedition07]

I don’t think anyone is saying the 3.5 engine isn’t reliable, just that the “study” posted isn’t reliable. I’m all for posting opinions and anecdotes, I do it all day long. Once you start throwing big words like “study” and “hypothesis” you better have normalized data, control groups, and any bias removed.

There’s a whole lot of Bayliners on the water from the 90’s, doesn’t mean they were built better than a Fountain. They just sold 15X as many Bayliners, anyone in the right mind would prefer the Fountain…..but higher ownership cost of the Fountain prevents that. Bayliner certainly is not more reliable.

There are studies that show pretty lousy cars as “longest lasting”, 5.4 3V comes to mind. Sure, because they had an engine replacement at 100k miles, of course they stay on the road.

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