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Thursday, Jul 26, 2012 7:45 PM UTC

Ford to recall 485,000 small SUVs to fix throttles

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Topics: From the Wires,

Ford to recall 485,000 small SUVs to fix throttlesFILE - In thie July 1, 2012 file photo, the Ford logo is seen on cars for sale at a Ford dealership in Springfield, Ill. Ford is recalling nearly 485,000 Escapes and Mavericks to fix sticking gas pedals that can cause crashes. The worldwide recall affects the 2001 through 2004 model years that are powered by 3-liter V-6 engines with cruise control. It comes just over a week after U.S. safety regulators began investigating the Escape small SUV. The U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has received 68 complaints about the problem, including 13 crashes, nine injuries and one death. A teenage girl died in the January crash of an Escape in Arizona.(AP Photo/Seth Perlman)(Credit: AP)

DETROIT (AP) — Ford is recalling nearly 485,000 Escapes and Mavericks to fix sticking gas pedals that can cause crashes.

The worldwide recall affects vehicles from the 2001 through 2004 model years that are powered by 3-liter V-6 engines with cruise control. It comes just over a week after U.S. safety regulators began investigating the small SUVs, which are called Mavericks in Europe.

The U.S. National Highway Traffic Safety Administration has received 68 complaints about the problem, including 13 crashes, nine injuries and one death. A teenage girl died when an Escape crashed in Arizona in January.

It’s the third recall in two weeks for the Escape, which was the top-selling SUV in the U.S. last month. A week ago Ford recalled 11,500 of the all-new 2013 models with 1.6-liter engines because the fuel lines can crack and leak gasoline, causing fires. A few days before that, it recalled 10,000 2013 Escapes to fix carpet padding that could interfere with braking.

On the older Escapes, which are completely different from the 2013 models, the cruise control cables can snag on the plastic cover atop the engine and cause the gas pedals to stick, Ford said. For the problem to happen, the pedals must be pushed to or near the floor, and the cruise control cables must have been bent or moved from their original position, Ford spokeswoman Marcey Zwiebel said. Cable positions can be changed when the SUVs are serviced, she said.

“This is not a situation where the engine would accelerate or go into a wide-open state on its own,” she said.

Dealers will replace the fasteners on the engine cover, raising it so there’s plenty of room for the cruise control cable. Zwiebel said it will take a few weeks to distribute the parts. In the meantime, Escape owners can take their vehicles to dealers, who will disconnect the cruise control and eliminate the risk of the problem happening, Zwiebel said.

Experts say if your car accelerates unexpectedly, you should step on the brake and shift into neutral, steer safely to the roadside, put the car in park and shut off the engine.

On July 17, NHTSA announced that it was investigating complaints about sticky throttles on Escapes and Mazda Tributes. Tributes are identical vehicles built by Ford for Mazda. It was unclear whether Tributes would be included in the recall.

NHTSA said investigators would look into whether the sticky throttles could have been caused by repairs made as part of a 2004 recall. About 590,000 Escapes and Tributes were recalled in December of 2004 to fix an accelerator cable defect, and NHTSA documents say the repairs could have damaged the cruise control cable.

While Ford said it moved quickly to fix the cruise control problem, Clarence Ditlow, executive director of the Center for Auto Safety, a consumer group, accused the company of knowing about the issue since 2005, but failing to take action until the government began its investigation.

Some Ford dealers had told the company that cruise control cables had been damaged during 2004 recall repairs, but the company did not know until recently that the problem could cause throttles to stick, Zwiebel said.

The Escape has been one of Ford’s most popular vehicles since it went on sale in 2000. More than 2.1 million have been sold. It was the top-selling small SUV in the country in three of the four years covered by the recall.

The latest recall affects 421,000 Escapes in the U.S. The rest are in Canada, Mexico, Europe, Asia and some smaller markets.

Recalls can often be signs of quality problems in cars, especially if there are several during the first model year. The 2013 Escape, which just arrived in showrooms in June, was recalled twice in one week earlier this month.

Ford CEO Alan Mulally told reporters Wednesday that the company quickly recalled the 2013 Escape to take care of customers. “I wouldn’t characterize it at all as a more fundamental issue in the quality,” he said.

Two recalls in one week are unusual, but more likely a coincidence than a sign of quality problems, Ditlow said. He questions a vehicle’s quality if it has three recalls in a year.

____

AP Auto Writer Dee-Ann Durbin in Detroit contributed to this report.

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