Liftgate, tailgate or trunk failure on the 2004 Ford Explorer
16 injuries 16 of the 195 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 liftgate, tailgate or trunk failure gets reported
Owners of the 2004 Ford Explorer report liftgate, tailgate or trunk failure at a median of 75,000 miles. A quarter of the reports come in before 51,000 miles and a quarter after 102,000 miles, from 164 reports that carried an odometer reading.
A part like this is normally expected to survive 82,000 miles. It is the 3rd most-reported problem on this model year.
The mileage distribution
The reported range runs from 40,000 miles at the tenth percentile to 139,000 miles at the ninetieth, a spread of 99,100 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.
10% of the dated reports were filed under 36,000 miles.
The whole distribution
| 10th | 25th | Median | 75th | 90th |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 40,000 miles | 51,212 miles | 75,400 miles | 102,000 miles | 139,100 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, 16 an injury 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 $250–$1,500 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 20 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 1996, at a median of 100 miles, and latest on the 2000 at 115,000 miles.
By volume the 2002 carries the most reports, with 343; the 2004 has 195. 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.
1. Opened the back hatch glass 2. The left hinge broke and the glass fell. I was able to catch the glass to keep it from falling. I pushed the glass back up and was able to get the glass closed and latched. My left shoulder has been hurting since the incident. *jb 3. I took the truck to the dealer and they replaced the hinge bracket. They replaced both the left and right hinges.
Dt: the contact stated there was NHTSA recall campaign 04v442000 regarding hatchback hinge and attachments. The vehicle has the same problems as indicated in the recall; however, it is not included in the recall due to the VIN. The contact took the vehicle to an independent repair shop but no repairs were made. *ak updated 1/25/2006 - the hinges sheared off and the hatch on the liftgate fell off when opening. The part has been replaced but fords replacement hinges have not been modified to correct the problem. Ford refused to pay for repair. *nm
The left hinge on the glass hatch failed during a normal closing operation. The light aluminum casting failed as a result of metal fatigue causing the full weight of the hatch to fall on my wife. The ford dealer claims this failure is not covered under NHTSA recall campaign number 04v442000 and that my wife must have brutalized this truck. The replacement parts that I purchased from the dealer and installed are clearly much heavier castings. The issues concerning campaign number 04v442000 still exist on this 2004 model year vehicle. I have the old parts and pictures comparing them to the new ones. *nm
Also reported on the 2004 Ford Explorer
Other powertrain problem
Other body or interior problem
Other visibility problem
Cruise control failure
Other engine problem
Complete transmission failure
How far this goes
Complaints are voluntary, so 195 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 liftgate, tailgate or trunk failure happen on the 2004 Ford Explorer?
Across 164 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 75,000 miles. A quarter were filed before 51,000 miles and a quarter after 102,000 miles. These are the mileages owners reported when they complained, not a prediction for any individual car.
How common is liftgate, tailgate or trunk failure on the 2004 Ford Explorer?
195 reports have been filed with NHTSA, about 1,127 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