2003 FORD WINDSTAR — Complaint #648467
Open-data reference.
NHTSA Complaint about SERVICE BRAKES, AIR:ANTILOCK:INTERCONNECTING ASSEMBLY(WIRING) filed December 4, 2007
NHTSA complaint #648467 (ODI reference 10210786) concerns a 2003 FORD WINDSTAR and was filed on December 4, 2007. The owner reports the failure occurred on November 30, 2007. The vehicle had 75,000 miles on the odometer at the time of the incident. The report was geocoded to Florida based on the filer's self-reported location. The affected component is categorized as service brakes, air:antilock:interconnecting assembly(wiring), 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: 0, 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. Because a VIN was supplied, this complaint is tied to a specific vehicle and not just a model-year cohort.
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 WINDSTAR cohort independently describe similar service brakes, air:antilock:interconnecting assembly(wiring) 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 2003 FORD WINDSTAR shows the complete component-level complaint distribution alongside any active investigations or recalls.
Complaint Description
ABS AND BRAKE WARNING LIGHTS ARE LIT ON DASH. DEALER SAYS THAT THE ABS ECU HAS FAILED AND THAT THE ANTILOCK BRAKES WILL NOT WORK UNTIL THIS IS REPLACED. AT THE SAME SERVICE VISIT THE DEALER FOUND THAT THE CRUISE CONTROL DEACTIVATION SWITCH WAS LEAKING BRAKE FLUID AND HAD FAILED AND NEEDED TO BE REPLACED DUE TO A FIRE HAZARD CAUSED BY LEAKING BRAKE FLUID. THE CRUISE CONTROL DEACTIVATION SWITCH IS CONNECTED DIRECTLY TO THE BRAKE MASTER CYLINDER AND THE CABLE FROM THE SWITCH CONNECTS DIRECTLY TO THE ABS ECU, WHEN THEY SHOWED ME THE DEFECTIVE SWITCH BEFORE REPLACING IT I OBSERVED BRAKE FLUID RUNNING DOWN THE SWITCH CABLE TO THE ABS ECU. I FEEL THERE IS A DIRECT RELATION TO BRAKE FLUID DRAINING ON TO THE ABS ECU AND ITS SUBSEQUENT FAILURE. THIS IS A SEALED ELECTRONIC MODULE THAT SHOULD NOT FAIL DURING THE LIFE OF THE VEHICLE. THE DEALER DOES NOT SEE IT THAT WAY OF COURSE. *TR
Complaint Details
| NHTSA Complaint ID | 648467 |
| ODI Number | 10210786 |
| Date Filed | December 4, 2007 |
| Failure Date | November 30, 2007 |
| VIN | 2FMZA51403B |
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.