2010 FORD FUSION — Complaint #942961
Open-data reference.
NHTSA Complaint about POWER TRAIN:AXLE ASSEMBLY:AXLE SHAFT:SEAL filed October 5, 2012
NHTSA complaint #942961 (ODI reference 10478781) concerns a 2010 FORD FUSION and was filed on October 5, 2012. The owner reports the failure occurred on October 4, 2012. The vehicle had 49,700 miles on the odometer at the time of the incident. The report was geocoded to Michigan based on the filer's self-reported location. The affected component is categorized as power train:axle assembly:axle shaft:seal, 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 FUSION cohort independently describe similar power train:axle assembly:axle shaft:seal 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 2010 FORD FUSION shows the complete component-level complaint distribution alongside any active investigations or recalls.
Complaint Description
ON OCTOBER 4, 2012, I WAS DRIVING MY 2010 FORD FUSION AROUND 40 M.P.H. ON A FOUR LANE STREET WHEN THE POWER STEERING FAILED/LOCKED FOR NO REASON. THE ELECTRONIC DISPLAY SAID "POWER STEERING ASSIST FAULT. SERVICE ADVANCETRAC" I DROVE STRAIGHT FOR 5 MILES AND KNEW THERE WAS A DEALER ON THE LEFT SIDE AND MANAGED A WIDE LEFT TURN INTO THE DEALERSHIP. WHEN I WAITED FOR THE REPRESENTATIVE TO COME TO MY CAR, I TURNED OFF THE ENGINE. I EXPLAINED WHAT HAPPENED AND HE ASKED TO SEE THE DISPLAY. I TURNED THE CAR BACK ON, THE DISPLAY WAS GONE AND THE POWER STEERING WAS BACK ON. I LEFT THE DEALER AND WENT ON-LINE AND FOUND NUMEROUS COMPLAINTS ABOUT THE SAME PROBLEM. I ALSO LEARNED THAT IT IS USELESS TO TAKE THE CAR TO FORD FOR SERVICE BECAUSE DEALERS CLAIM THAT THE COMPUTER IS NOT SHOWING A DIAGNOSTIC CODE AND THEY NEED TO "REPLICATE THE PROBLEM" (WHICH IS HIGHLY UNLIKELY THAT IT WILL HAPPEN WHILE AT THE DEALER). I ALSO LEARNED THAT IT HAS HAPPENED TO SOME CUSTOMERS MANY TIMES AND THERE IS
Complaint Details
| NHTSA Complaint ID | 942961 |
| ODI Number | 10478781 |
| Date Filed | October 5, 2012 |
| Failure Date | October 4, 2012 |
| VIN | 3FAHP0JA7AR |
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.