Took the GT in for it's 5K service today.. told them about my leaking brake reservior cap... any guesses as to their solution?

yep.... you guessed it... they siphoned out some fluid to lower the level, stating the factory was overfilling the reserviors causing them to spill over during driving. Nice fix.

 

Yeah, they all leak a little (at least the '05's do). I wrapped a little Teflon plumbers tape around the threads...hasn't leaked in over a year. Think that's better than draining some fluid off...

 

Still havent leaked anything yet

 

Mine I wipe off the top area of the reservoir around oil change time. Mine is more of a film & certainly not enough to run over the side, at least not as yet (knock on wood).

 

Don't take your car in if you have an oil leak, they might take a couple of quarts out and tell you again that the factory is 'over filling them'.

 

My brake fluid reservoir leaked when I first got the car, enough that I had to touch up some spots on the inner fender/rail. It was filled about 1/4" over the FULL mark, I removed fluid until it was 1/4" below the FULL mark and it hasn't leaked since. Ford needs to stop overfilling the reservoirs and should also notify the dealers to watch out for overfill when their techs do the PDI. It wouldn't hurt if Ford redesigned the reservoir so that if it was full or slightly overfull it wouldn't leak, peeling paint is not something a new car owner wants to see.

 

I just noticed a little leaking on my '07 the other day. You would think they would have fixed it by now.

 

Ford is still using the same vented (slit) cap... you can do one of three things:

1) employ the teflon-tape fix
2) lower fluid level to upper fill-line (if it's above, it's overfilled)
3) do nothing

 

I removed some from my resevoir a few months ago, and just checked it earlier today, no more leaking. It's still well above the minimum line.

 

You know, this is really unbelievable. I cannot understand why Ford is not doing something about this. It is obviously a faulty reservoir. Specifically the upper surface of the filler neck is not flat, so the cap can't get a good seal. I don't think there is even a TSB out on this, and a lot of people have seen this problem. I think it should be a recall.

A lot of guys here on the forum have mentioned the problem. Maybe the majority of Mustang owners really don't carefully look under their hoods. With all those Mustangs out there, Ford should have heard a lot of complaints by now.

 

Well, being as all Mustangs do this, in Ford's eyes, it's normal.

Just like when I took mine back for the air blowing in the defog vents when in foot only. They checked other Mustangs on the lot, said they all do it, showed a bulletin from Ford that said it's normal.

I guess then that when Pintos blow up when you rear end them, as long as they all do it, it's normal.

Ford sucks when it comes to fixing their poor workmanship and design.


Mike

 

There are 4 people at work with S197 GTs. None of them gave a rat's a$$ when I told them about leaky brake fluid reservoirs. 3 of them were stored for the winter (as if it is hard to go and check) and 1 of them is a daily driver. My GT had fluid all over the reservoir the day it came from Flat Rock, MI.

 

Took some "cotton tubing" (my wife gets them at her nail salon --comes in 8 inch pieces)...cut it into two (2) one and a half inch pieces and stuff them in front of and in back of the brake filler cap carefully with a flat tip screwdriver...and it's been 9 months with no fluid leaking anywhere...(the cotton seems to soak up any excess that is escaping)...problem solved and I didn't have to remove any brake fluid...

 

I didn't notice mine was leaking that badly until I looked under the reservior and saw the paint peeling off of the inner fender.

 

They did this same thing with mine about 6 months ago and have had no issue since.
It may not be a great fix but it was a fix

 

some body had theirs repainted by ford when that happened to them. I have seen where ford has replaced the faulty part/parts and also I have heard they just remove some fluid.
mine finaly stoped leaking I think. I just kept wiping it off about once a week.

 

My story was... I saw a small leak. Brought it in to the dealer. They said all it needed was for the cap seal to be cleaned. Leak was back, brought it in again. They replaced the cap. Leak was still there. I think by that time both the service guy, the tech and I were all pretty well convinced that it was a bad reservoir. So they finally replaced it. No more leaks for over a year.

It shouldn't be that tough to get a warranty repair on such a critical safety system as the brakes. But, I wasn't going to take no for an answer. If I'm not mistaken, brake fluid is also flammable. Wasn't that part of the problem in the F-150 recall?

Anyway, enough with the ranting. I love my Mustang. The brake thing was the only problem I've had with the car. The overall quality still rates a 98 in my book.

 

I think that guy also had to take his car back to the dealer after the dealer scratched up other parts of his car while trying to repaint the panel. I don't trust the dealer enough to have them fix it. I have plans to repaint it myself in the spring when the car is out of storage. It really ****ed me off to see how much of the paint had peeled up even though I checked the cap regularly and wiped the brake fluid off the top .

 

The below quote (from an ex Ford product planner) might shed a little light on why this issue hasn't yet been addressed >>

I'm an ex-Ford product planner that was forced into retirement in Jan 2006 because I complained about inept Management that focused more on self aggrandizement than what was best for the customer, the decision processes used by the inept Management, and the resulting uncompetitive products. Ford's product decisions were always strictly financially based, using volume and revenue assumptions provided by Marketing that were fantasy at best and fraudulent at worst. Competitiveness was always a secondary consideration. The planners that I'm still in contact with say this system has not improved and has in fact gotten worse.

All the product changes suggested in the preceding comments (European Focus, Australian Falcon, European Mondeos as Mercury’s) have been considered but rejected for “financial” reasons. Like anything, it’s real easy to find a way to do something if you have the “will” to do it, and if you don’t, financials can be manipulated to make any proposition look unattractive. Alan Mullaly is surrounded by Senior Management who attained their positions due to their political skills, not their technical capability. Having an ex-Nassarite marketing guy (Mark Fields) in charge of Ford N.A. is a public embarrassment for a company with the economic and product issues that Ford faces. His initial suggestion for improving Ford was a $100 mil marketing campaign with Taylor Hicks singing the praises of the Company. Has it worked? Has he been held accountable?

Jac Nassar was responsible for the Explorer debacle. Although Ford neither designed nor manufactured tires, we used to have knowledgeable tire engineers. Jac with his “black box” approach to suppliers thought these people had no added value and got rid of them even though they were the only people smart enough to ask the right questions and recognize when we were being hosed.

My experience with Ford marketing types is they know more about shrimp and chardonnay than they do about cars. Bob Lutz recently commented that when the big 3 ruled the American market, GM/Ford/Chrysler were run by design and engineering. They are now run by marketing and finance and the results are self evident. Ford is doomed, unless Mr. Mullaly actually changes the culture, but there is no sign of it yet.

 

A word of advise......

Teflon tape MELTS in brake fluid.

Repeat


Teflon tape MELTS in brake fluid.

If you don`t believe me , get a small clear class jar , put a little
Brake fluid in it and then add the teflon tape , come back in a hour.