Total Complaints
1 filings
FORD FORD · model year
1 NHTSA complaints for this specific cohort.
NHTSA overall rating
Not crash-tested
New Car Assessment Program
The 1979FORDFORD carries 1 consumer safety complaint in NHTSA's Office of Defects Investigation database for this specific model-year cohort. Within that volume, owners reported 0 crashes, 0 fires, 0 injuries, and 0 fatalities. No NCAP 5-star crash-test rating is available for this model year in the federal database.
Component-level analysis is where model-year complaints become actionable: the top complaint category for the 1979 FORD is tires with 1 filings. Concentration in one or two component groups is the classic signature of a systemic defect; a flat distribution usually reflects normal aging, warranty complaints, or isolated build-plant variability.
NHTSA currently has 74 investigation files overlapping the 1979 FORD, and 2 remain open. Owners comparing this cohort against neighboring years should pair the counters above with the complaint-by-year trend on the parent model page — a spike in a single year often tracks to a platform refresh, a new transmission supplier, or an updated ECU calibration. Use the related-complaint feed below to read raw owner narratives before deciding whether any pattern here affects your specific use case.
Total Complaints
1 filings
Crashes Reported
0 reports
Source
NHTSA ODI
Federal complaints database
At or below the fleet median complaint volume.
| Component | Count |
|---|---|
| TIRES | 1 |
I FIRST BOUGHT A SET OF THESE TIRES IN 1996. THE RIDE WAS ROUGH FROM THE BEGINNING, AND I COMPLAINED. THE DEALER TOLD ME THEY WERE "OUT OF ROUND BUT WITHIN GOODYEAR SPECS". I CONTINUED TO DRIVE WITH A NOTICEABLE VIBRATION BECAUSE THEY WOULD NOT REPLACE THE TIRES AND I COULD NOT AFFORD TO REPLACE THEM. IN THE FALL OF '98,ONE OF THE IRES DELAMINATED WHILE DRIVING AT HIGHWAY SPEED. I PUT ON MY SPARE AND CONTINUED. I COULD NOT FIND A REPLACEMENT LOCALLY, AND CONTINUED TO DRIVE ON MY SPARE. LESS THAN 3 WEEKS LATER, A SECOND TIRE DELAMINATED. I THEN DROVE TO ANOTHER TOWN 50 MILES AWAY AND TOLD THEM OF THE PROBLEM, AND INSISTED THEY REPLACE ALL 4 TIRES, WHICH THEY DID AT A PRORATED PRICE.THE SECOND SET RODE WITH A SLIGHT VIBRATION, BUT WAS BETTER THAN THE FIRST. THIS GRADUALLY DETERIORATED, UNTIL I WAS DRIVING WITH MUCH VIBRATION. BALANCING WOULD NOT HELP. IN SET. OF 2000 ANOTHER TIRE DELAMINATED. GOODYERA NO LONGE MAKES THIS TIRE, AND SENT ME A REFUND. I THEN BOUGHT 2 MICHELINS, USING THE MA
B-Pillar Trim Detachment
Rear-view Camera Failure
Loss of braking caused by rear brake hose failure
Healey Brothers Ford / Open Recall Sale
Power Tailgate Release Systems
Data as of 2025. Sources: NHTSA Office of Defects Investigation (ODI) complaints database, NHTSA recall campaign API, NHTSA NCAP crash-test ratings, and NHTSA FARS for fatality cross-reference.
Read our methodology — how this data is sourced, computed, and verified.