Aug. 14, 2019—Ford on Wednesday announced it is extending its warranty for 560,000 Focus and Fiesta cars and will reimburse owners who have paid for repairs not covered by the previous warranty, according to a report by The Detroit Free Press.
Ford said it would extend the warranty to seven years and 100,000 miles on "clutch and related materials" for 2014-16 Focus and 2014-15 Fiesta vehicles.
The cars are equipped with a dual-clutch transmission. The transmission was intended to provide the fuel economy and acceleration of a manual transmission with the ease of an automatic. The transmissions, which boosted fuel economy to meet federal standards as gas prices spiked, were introduced in the 2011 model year Fiesta and 2012 Focus. They were used until the Focus was discontinued with the 2018 model year and until the 2019 Fiesta.
Ford said Wednesday its actions were "independent of any media or litigation," which includes a class-action case whose $35 million settlement is under review and about 13,000 other cases from vehicle owners who opted out of the class action.