i am the disgruntled owner of a 2001 ford F-150 supercrew pick-up. it recently came to my attention that the rocker panels of my truck are completely rusted out, being held together by paint and clear coat. my truck has under 100,000 miles and is in excellent running condition. i took my truck to a ford dealership and was told that the manufacture warranty was up by 3 months, and they weren't going to do anything about the damage. rust damage like this doesn't just happen overnight. i'm really pissed off because i bought the truck from a ford dealership, and paid a lot of money for this truck. only to find out that there is extensive corrosion to the rocker panels. do the math, the truck is an 2001 with completely rusted out panels, some surface rust is to be expected. but this is a load of crap, i've had 2 different body shops look at my truck, one was a Ford body shop, and both times they said that they had never seen damage that extensive on such a new truck. Ford screwed something up and now i'm paying for it....

 

do you live where it is very salty? do they salt the roads? how did you come to find the damage.

 

5-year outer body rust through. 5 years from build date or in service date,can't remember which.

 

Warranty coverage is always from the in-service date, and corrosion coverage is 5 years/ unlimited miles. I'm assuming this truck was sold new in the summer of 2000? How else could it be "3 months out of warranty?"

Although Ford's warranty excludes damage from salt, I'd fight this tooth and nail. You're right- this damage didn't suddenly occur in the past 3 months, so it had to have been pretty extensive BEFORE the warranty expired. BTW, is the damage visible while standing by the truck? Ford's rust-through coverage is for OUTER body sheet metal; if the rust is on the inside (and you'd have to put it up on a lift or crawl underneath to see it), they may deny you coverage.

 

Mines a 96 and I have no visible rust but mine is well taken care of. Sounds like you didn't wash it real well. Whats the truck used for? Do you wash the mud and gunk from underneath?
We all complain about our trucks from time to time but we don't start our first post ever by saying Ford is screwing us.