Ford Focus New Engine £4000

Associate
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Cars in for MOT and wife has had a call that our Focus from 2012 needs a new engine.
We have it serviced every year but apparently theres been an oil leak and now the head gasket and cambelt need replacing.

Ford have said better off replacing engine at the cost of £4000.
Does this sound reasonable? I have nothing to compare against and google is a bit hit and miss so not very clear what a new engine should cost.

Thanks in advance
 
Caporegime
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New engine for a head gasket and a serviceable item (cambelt), erm OK!

Take the car to a respected independent garage and get it checked out.

Ford probably want to chuck a new engine in as it is the relatively "easy" thing to do and avoids having to actually diagnose the problems.
 
Soldato
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For a main dealer the price is "reasonable", but for you it's not.

Best advice is to get it somewhere reputable and see what they think, might well need a new or alternative engine but £4k is far too much - a freshly rebuilt engine for a focus ST would be just under £4k (for some sort of comparison). Complete short block around £1500
 
Soldato
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It doesn't sound reasonable at all...
Your car is probably not worth 4k
An used engine would cost less than £1000 plus fitting costs
If the head gasket is gone, you probably don't need a complete engine, probably a new head gasket and the cylinder head skimmed... ofc could be something else

Was the car smoking, burning oil, having coolant in the oil or a milky residue on the oil cap?
 
Caporegime
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Depends what engine it is - if it's the 1.0 Ecoboost the cambelt is inside the engine, and is quite a lengthy job labour wise to replace (~£800 I believe)

Not an expert on the ecoboost engine but the "belt" seems to be 10year or 150k, is it even a belt anyway or chain? I've read post from people so say it's "oil soaked", so what the OP said about an oil leak and belt makes 0 sense.

Edit - it has a belt running in oil.

 
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Soldato
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Not reasonable. Stay away from Ford dealers if possible. Go to an independent and get an opinion. Don't tell them what Ford said. Let them decide.
 
Associate
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Change car rather than a replacement engien at that cost. If you really love the car then look for an independent and get a price. Is the car driveable?
 

Dup

Dup

Soldato
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Seems like they don't have the time nor skills to strip and diagnose the issue properly. I guess being a Ford dealer they just want the plug and play solution. Even a head gasket replacement shouldn't ruin you too north of £1k done properly on most cars and I can't see why a 2012 Focus would be any different. See if there is a Ford specialist or reccomended garage local to you (avoid high street names) and get a second opinion.
 
Associate
OP
Joined
15 Jun 2009
Posts
178
Location
Bournemouth
Thanks everyone for the feedback.
No signs of issue when driving the car. Its just come up now its in for its MOT.

They did mention something about oil being over filled. Asked my wife to dig a bit more when she speaks to them about that but the engineers were on a lunch break when she just called back.
Its serviced by Ford, so if someones over filled it, its them.

Only bit of feedback she did get on recalling, is now they dont want to rev it incase the engine goes, so they wont do the MOT.
Originally they said they would do MOT and then we could think about engine.

Plan i think is to get it back and into an independant asap before MOT runs out in 4 days.

edit: and they are saying new engine given the cambelt is few hundread on its own so that plus gasket, they recon new engine.
 
Soldato
Joined
22 Nov 2006
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23,304
Just get someone to fit a new gasket :p

Those engines are known for it afaik. Take it to an actual specialist/tuner who take these engines to bits every day. Not a dealer mechanic because if they **** it up (e.g. use too much sealer and clog oil lines) it will create a far bigger problem and they'll never admit it.
 
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Soldato
Joined
21 Jan 2010
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21,949
Don't these blow head gaskets for fun due to inadequate cooling plus dodgy pipes? Get them to itemise the quote so you can go to Ford directly.
 
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