Wiper or washer failure on the 2000 Ford Expedition
2 fires 2 of the 24 reports for this failure mention a crash, a fire, an injury or a death. Those are the owner's words on the complaint form, not a verified finding, and one report can mention more than one.
When wiper or washer failure gets reported
Owners of the 2000 Ford Expedition report wiper or washer failure at a median of 105,000 miles. A quarter of the reports come in before 55,000 miles and a quarter after 120,000 miles, from 15 reports that carried an odometer reading.
A part like this is normally expected to survive 80,000 miles. It is the 12th most-reported problem on this model year.
The mileage distribution
The reported range runs from 40,000 miles at the tenth percentile to 145,000 miles at the ninetieth, a spread of 102,366 miles across the middle 80% of reports.
When the reports scatter this far, the mileage is telling you about how these cars were driven more than about the part itself.
7% of the dated reports were filed under 36,000 miles.
The whole distribution
| 10th | 25th | Median | 75th | 90th |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 40,634 miles | 56,000 miles | 105,000 miles | 117,500 miles | 143,000 miles |
Read the 10th percentile as “one report in ten arrived this early”. Exact figures are shown in this table because it is the table of record; everywhere else on the site they are rounded to the precision the sample can carry.
What a percentile can and cannot tell you here
These five numbers describe the readings owners gave, in order. The median is the middle one: half the reports arrived below it. The 10th and 90th are the edges of the bulk of the distribution, and the distance between them is the part worth reading. A tight spread — say 70,000 to 95,000 miles — points at something that wears out on a schedule, and the schedule is knowable. A wide one, 20,000 to 190,000, points at a fault that hits some cars and never troubles others, which means the mileage on the listing in front of you tells you very little about your odds.
What these figures are not is a survival curve. Every reading here comes from a car whose owner filed a complaint, so the sample contains only failures: it cannot say what share of the fleet made it past 150,000 miles untouched, because those owners had nothing to report. Nor is the mileage the moment of failure — it is the odometer reading as recalled at the time of filing, which may be weeks later and is sometimes rounded to the nearest ten thousand by the person typing it.
Percentiles are shown at all only once 8 readings exist for the vehicle and mode. Below that the middle of a handful of numbers is noise wearing a decimal point, so the figures are withheld rather than dressed up.
What happens, and what it costs
Of these reports, 2 a fire is mentioned. Owners write their own complaints and the agency does not verify them, so read this as what the reports say happened rather than as a confirmed count.
Putting it right typically runs $120–$800 at an independent US shop. That range is an editorial estimate held in this site's failure-mode catalogue, not a figure from NHTSA, and it is a repair cost rather than a diagnosis cost.
The same failure on other years
The same failure is reported on 7 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 1999, at a median of 35,000 miles, and latest on the 2000 at 105,000 miles.
By volume the 1999 carries the most reports, with 45; the 2000 has 24. A mode that appears across most years of a model is usually a design choice rather than a bad batch.
If one year stands out to the left, that is the year to avoid; if the whole line sits at a similar mileage, this is wear rather than a defect in one production run.
Tick median reported mileage Solid middle half of reports Faint 10th to 90th percentile Colour how bad the failure is when it happens
What owners wrote
Verbatim from NHTSA complaint narratives, trimmed for length. The mileage is the one the owner gave.
When I turned on ignition wipers started to operate without being turned on. Smoke began blowing from vent area. I turned off ignition and all electrical. Wipers and washer failed to operate. Wiper motor connector caught fire and burnt out wiper motor. Repaired at "ron bortnick ford" upper marlboro md. 20772. *la
Consumer was awakened after smelling smoke. He went to the garage and the door was too hot to touch. Vehicle was on fire. T a recall was received on the windshield wiper motor. However the fire seems started under the hood.*ak
After my truck sat in a downpour, I got into it to run an errand. The radio completly shut off when the vehicle was in drive or reverse. When put into park it came right back on. The next rain we had, a few weeks later, I was driving and different instument lights began to come on. 4x4, windshield wiper fluid, etc. Lights were illuminated. The vehicle was not in 4x4 at this time and the windshield washer fluid was 3/4 of the way full. A few days later while driving in the rain again my wipers completly quit working. Every 10 seconds or so they would kick on again for about 3 seconds and then stop again. This was an absolutly terrifying situation. I was driving in the pouring down rain on an incredibly busy street and my wipers quit. After the first couple of incidents my husband and I narrowed it down to having something to do with rain water. I asked a ford tech about this over the phone and was treated like I had absolutly no idea what I was talking about. I finally took it into a different ford dealership and was told that in fact the seal around the windshield was leaking, allowing water in to short out the electronics. I am…
Also reported on the 2000 Ford Expedition
Other wheel or tire problem
Other electrical problem
Cruise control failure
Other engine problem
Misfire or rough idle
Other body or interior problem
How far this goes
Complaints are voluntary, so 24 is a floor and not a count of affected cars. Mileages are typed in by owners and cluster on round numbers. And the mode itself is assigned by software reading the complaint text, which is reliable in bulk and fallible one report at a time.
Questions this page answers
At what mileage does wiper or washer failure happen on the 2000 Ford Expedition?
Across 15 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 105,000 miles. A quarter were filed before 55,000 miles and a quarter after 120,000 miles. These are the mileages owners reported when they complained, not a prediction for any individual car.
How common is wiper or washer failure on the 2000 Ford Expedition?
24 reports have been filed with NHTSA, about 0.1 per 1,000 vehicles. Complaints are voluntary, so this is a floor rather than a count of affected cars.
What this is and is not. These are the mileages at which owners chose to complain to a federal agency, which is not the same as the mileage at which the part fails on every car. It skews toward failures that happened outside warranty, cost real money, or frightened someone. It is still the only public dataset that carries failure mileage at all, and the shape of a few hundred readings is informative even when a single one is not. Methodology · JSON · this failure on other cars
Source Owner complaints and recall records published by the US National Highway Traffic Safety Administration, model years 1996–2027 Figures rebuilt Published by AtWhatMileage How every figure is computed