Trans dead (couple months after replacing the motor)

[Jason Krakauer]

My '17 SCREW is on a lift waiting on parts - finally got my 3rd party warranty co. to cover the cost of a full rebuild ($6K+). Long story, short, the truck only has about 73K miles on it, bought it 1-owner-used back in Feb '20 from a Hyundai Dealer (and paid for a 3rd party national inspection chain to do a full check-up). Since then it's been a total shit-show.

August last year - had a rattling noise at speed from the front end. Nailed that down to a destroyed boot on the u-joint, front drive shaft, where it meets up w/ the transfer case. Got lucky, found a local shop to rebuild the joint and it was only a couple hundred bucks to correct.

September - had a low oil pressure light and check engine ... after initial diagnosis as a cracked valve cover and bad oil press. sending unit, we discovered it was running single digit oil pressures. Bearings were shot, motor replaced w/ a new factory unit for nearly $10K (fully out-of-pocket since I was out of factory warranty and hadn't yet signed on to a 3rd party).

December - trans is acting "funny" on cold start ... won't upshift, then the indicator flips back and forth between 1st/4th and won't engage. "wrench" light ... and then a check engine light. Also get some real hard shifts at low speeds until temps come up (which takes literally 10-15 miles). Shop checked it over and they determined it was a full rebuild ... probably overheating d/t slippage and possible bad valve body/torque converter.

So in the span of a single calendar year and less than 10K miles I'm on (nearly) an all new drivetrain. I got lucky in that I decided to get in bed w/ a 3rd party warranty co. after my engine debacle. But even dealing w/ them was a 2.5 week ordeal, lots of fighting to get coverage. All I can think is that the previous owner (only other) beat the ever-living shit out of my truck. No maintenance or just ragged it out and dumped it when they got some initial bad vibes. Most of the trouble was probably too hard to detect by that inspection company (no warning lights or codes ... ran fine at test drive). But ****-me.

Just a warning to anyone out there getting into the 2nd hand market on these. That 10-speed is probably a long-term headache and you better have good records on prior maintenance on the motor. Nothing comes cheap on repair/replacement here.

 

[CoronaRaptor]

Yeah, that sounds like a real sh-t show for you. At least now you have a good drivetrain. Don't do tranny flushes either on your new transmission, just drain and refill or leave it alone.

 

[FordTechOne]

This is the problem with buying used. You never know the true history of the vehicle and how it was treated. If the engine was consuming enough oil to starve the bearings, it needed the TSB completed for valve cover replacement. If the valve cover was leaking that much oil externally it would have been obvious.

As far as the transmission, the 10R is no different than any other automatic; same design principles and components. There is nothing about it that would make for a “long term headache”. It’s fully serviceable as well, meaning it can be repaired internally without the need to replace the entire unit.

3rd party warranties are typically difficult to deal with and will try everything to avoid paying a claim. I recommend Ford Protect/ESP or nothing.

 

[zombiekiller]

the carfax on my truck is hilariously "clean".


Low miles, clean title, always offroaded. don't low ball me, I know what I have.


The good news is, once you have a baseline of a known good drivetrain, these trucks are fairly easy to maintain.

 

[smurfslayer]

Yeah, a visit to Raptor Assault gives some pretty solid respect for that 10 speed transmission. You never even think about it. Which is to say, it never interferes with you, and that’s exactly what you want. It just works.

Hard part engine problems with the 3.5TT are pretty rare, and the transmission itself - also, pretty rare from postings here. Still, they do happen.

As you’ve said, you’re going to have essentially a new drive train.

 

[Jason Krakauer]

Yeah - i mean every part is only as good as it's treated - but you have the 10r80 in one of its first applications in a '17 F150. I realize the 1st owner likely pounded on mine (prob. causing my headache) but I don't think you can make a blanket statement like it's "as good as" any other unit. Extra complexity can add new areas for faults. My point was that nothing in the driveline is cheap to fix... the 6-speed predecessor would only run about $3500 to rebuild, so it's effectively double the cost. The 3.5 HO was equally more expensive than the standard-duty unit.

You can say any "used" vehicle is a crap-shoot and I suppose that's right. But, honestly, any vehicle requiring a replacement motor/trans at under 75K miles is a little silly. These units should be able to run 150K miles w/o incident (and I'm talking desert running/towing/mud bogging - as designed).

I'm not really making a value/quality point here ... never said "Fords are trash..." or anything of the sort. In fact, w/ this new driveline and the cash I'm out already ... I'll be driving this particular Raptor for years to offset that expense. Assuming there aren't any other major issues, believe it or not, I'm still happy to be doing it too. And because of the way they hold their value, I'm actually pretty bullish on being able to sell it (eventually) for good money w/ ppwk showing it's basically brand new at 75K miles.

 

[SilverBolt]

How did you spend $10k on a stock engine swap? A complete long block is $3500 from Tasca.

 

[Jason Krakauer]

I actually bought the long block from Tasca, by the time you add tax/shipping and return shipping it's more like $4500 ... labor for removing the old motor, swapping over all accessories (turbos, pulleys, intake/exhaust manifolds, etc. was like $5K (this also included the original cost of labor for changing out the cracked valve cover, replacing the old oil sending unit, and associated investigative efforts first round).

If I wanted to be really hard up on them - I could have pressed to reduce the total labor bill by like $7-800 since they did work on that initial effort before realizing the motor was spent. Not that they didn't do the work, just that their initial diagnosis was technically correct, just not the ultimate cause of my problems.

 

[FordTechOne]

Yeah - i mean every part is only as good as it's treated - but you have the 10r80 in one of its first applications in a '17 F150. I realize the 1st owner likely pounded on mine (prob. causing my headache) but I don't think you can make a blanket statement like it's "as good as" any other unit. Extra complexity can add new areas for faults. My point was that nothing in the driveline is cheap to fix... the 6-speed predecessor would only run about $3500 to rebuild, so it's effectively double the cost. The 3.5 HO was equally more expensive than the standard-duty unit.

The 10R80 should not be even close to double the cost to repair vs. the 6R80. The 10R has 4 planetary gear sets, 6 clutch packs, and a one-way clutch. 6R80 has 3 planetary gear sets, 5 clutch packs, and a one-way clutch. If you were charged $7,000 to repair the transmission, something is wrong. The complete unit is only $2700.

You can say any "used" vehicle is a crap-shoot and I suppose that's right. But, honestly, any vehicle requiring a replacement motor/trans at under 75K miles is a little silly. These units should be able to run 150K miles w/o incident (and I'm talking desert running/towing/mud bogging - as designed).

The engine was damaged because it was ran low on oil. The previous owner either didn’t care that it was burning oil or never bothered to check, Ford released a TSB for the issue. Your new engine will have the updated design for both the valve covers and oil pan. It sounds like the transmission was most likely abused by the PO as well, resulting in failure. If there was a manufacturing defect it certainly would have occurred before 5yr/60k. There is no expected mileage when abuse or lack of maintenance is a factor.

I'm not really making a value/quality point here ... never said "Fords are trash..." or anything of the sort. In fact, w/ this new driveline and the cash I'm out already ... I'll be driving this particular Raptor for years to offset that expense. Assuming there aren't any other major issues, believe it or not, I'm still happy to be doing it too. And because of the way they hold their value, I'm actually pretty bullish on being able to sell it (eventually) for good money w/ ppwk showing it's basically brand new at 75K miles.

Glad to hear you’re happy with the truck and it’s running well again; those major expenses are definitely a let down, but hopefully you’re still ahead of the game vs. the cost of a brand new model. Unfortunately there’s always a gamble buying a used vehicle, especially a high performance vehicle like the Raptor. Look no further than YouTube to see how people treat their vehicles, it’s unbelievable.

 

[Badgertits]

Well- that confirms a dispute for me on this forum, you can get a raptor crate motor for $10k.......I’d like to put that in stripped out basic bitch 4 banger mustang, tune it w/ **** injection & add a huge IC & downpipes thing would be stupid