1999 FORD F-150 — Complaint #279752
Open-data reference.
NHTSA Complaint about EQUIPMENT:MECHANICAL:WRECKER AND WHEEL LIFT DEVICES filed March 14, 2001
NHTSA complaint #279752 (ODI reference 741814) concerns a 1999 FORD F-150 and was filed on March 14, 2001. The owner reports the failure occurred on October 3, 1999. The report was geocoded to Michigan based on the filer's self-reported location. The affected component is categorized as equipment:mechanical:wrecker and wheel lift devices, one of NHTSA's standardized taxonomy codes used to group defect patterns across make, model, and year.
The filer flagged the following severity indicators: crash: no, fire: no, injuries: 2, fatalities: 0. No crash, fire, or fatality was associated with this report, which places it in the early-warning stream rather than the priority-review stream. No VIN was supplied by the filer, so this complaint contributes to model-year trend data but cannot be tied to a specific vehicle.
Individual complaints are consumer-submitted and unverified by NHTSA engineers — the agency's role at this stage is to collect, index, and make them searchable. What matters for federal action is the pattern: when many owners of the same FORD F-150 cohort independently describe similar equipment:mechanical:wrecker and wheel lift devices failures, defect investigators have grounds to open a PE and request manufacturer data. Related filings for the same vehicle and component appear below, and the detail page for the full 1999 FORD F-150 shows the complete component-level complaint distribution alongside any active investigations or recalls.
Complaint Description
TRAILER HITCH RECEIVER CAN NOW HAVE SAFEY TRIM FROM US PATENT 5,934,699-6,176,506 I CUT MY LEG , MY CHILD CUT HIS HAND ON RUSTING HITCH RECEIVER AND THE HITCH TORE UP A VEHCILE THAT WOULD HAVE BEEN PREVENTED IF THE UNIVERSAL SAFETY TRAILER HITCH COVER ASSEMBLY DESIGNED BOTH BOTH OEM AND AFTERMARKET WAS APPLIED. THE SAFETY TRIM IS SNAP-ON CONSUMER INSTALLED APPLIED TO THE EXTERIOR OF THE HITCH RECEIVER NOW A STANDARD ON OEM VEHICLES WITH 80 MILLION US TRUCK REGISTRATIONS THE ONLY HELP TO GET OEM'S TO COVER THIS ROUGH PEICE OF RUSTING STEEL IS WWW.BLUEOVALNEWS.COM. THE SAFETY TRAILER HITCH COVER ASSEMBLY IS NOT A OEM OR AFTERMARKET PRODUCT BUT A SAFETY DEVICE DESIGNED BY A CONSUMER. OEMS AR AVOIDING ANY ADDITIONAL COST FOR THIS TRIM EVEN THOUGH THE SAE SAFETY DEVICE DESIGN FITS THE BEST SELLING AFTERMARKET CLASS III HITCH AS WELL. A CROSS PLATFORM DESIGN NEEDS YOUR HELP TO MAKE THEM COVER THIS EYE SORE AND DANGER TO THE TOUCH. 1-800-759-8888 EXT.1824828#*AK
Complaint Details
| NHTSA Complaint ID | 279752 |
| ODI Number | 741814 |
| Date Filed | March 14, 2001 |
| Failure Date | October 3, 1999 |
Source: NHTSA Vehicle Complaints Database. Component taxonomy and severity codes are standardized by NHTSA Office of Defects Investigation.
Read our methodology — how this data is sourced, computed, and verified.