Alternator or charging system failure on the 2014 Ford Explorer
1 crash 1 of the 10 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 alternator or charging system failure gets reported
Owners of the 2014 Ford Explorer report alternator or charging system failure at a median of 80,000 miles. A quarter of the reports come in before 55,000 miles and a quarter after 105,000 miles, from 8 reports that carried an odometer reading.
A part like this is normally expected to survive 98,000 miles. It is the 31st most-reported problem on this model year.
The mileage distribution
The reported range runs from 55,000 miles at the tenth percentile to 130,000 miles at the ninetieth, a spread of 73,617 miles across the middle 80% of reports.
A spread this wide points at use rather than design. Towing, climate, service history and city mileage all move a failure like this, so the median is a weak guide to any individual car.
0% of the dated reports were filed under 36,000 miles.
The whole distribution
| 10th | 25th | Median | 75th | 90th |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 57,000 miles | 57,000 miles | 80,869 miles | 103,435 miles | 130,617 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, 1 a crash 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 $450–$1,600 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 14 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 1997, at a median of 15,000 miles, and latest on the 2005 at 140,000 miles.
By volume the 2013 carries the most reports, with 14; the 2014 has 10. 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.
Driving on highway approx 65 MPH in rain. Sudden loss of power steering, message on dashboard indicating check charging system, then hill assist failure, then warning message that all accessory power was disabled to conserve power. Then all lights on dashboard lit up. Loss of power steering in rain on highway almost caused vehicle to lose control and be involved in multiple car accident. Serpentine belt was found to be in proper condition, and was able to drive home alternate route along 35mph roads. No further problems aside from occasional squeak under acceleration. Immediately followed up with service call, serpentine bell was in good condition, but belt tensioner spring had failed. Vehicle has only 57,000 miles. Seems excessively early for this type of part to fail.
Driving on highway approx 65 MPH in rain. Sudden loss of power steering, message on dashboard indicating check charging system, then hill assist failure, then warning message that all accessory power was disabled to conserve power. Then all lights on dashboard lit up. Loss of power steering in rain on highway almost caused vehicle to lose control and be involved in multiple car accident. Serpentine belt was found to be in proper condition, and was able to drive home alternate route along 35mph roads. No further problems aside from occasional squeak under acceleration. Immediately followed up with service call, serpentine bell was in good condition, but belt tensioner spring had failed. Vehicle has only 57,000 miles. Seems excessively early for this type of part to fail.
Driving on highway approx 65 MPH in rain. Sudden loss of power steering, message on dashboard indicating check charging system, then hill assist failure, then warning message that all accessory power was disabled to conserve power. Then all lights on dashboard lit up. Loss of power steering in rain on highway almost caused vehicle to lose control and be involved in multiple car accident. Serpentine belt was found to be in proper condition, and was able to drive home alternate route along 35mph roads. No further problems aside from occasional squeak under acceleration. Immediately followed up with service call, serpentine bell was in good condition, but belt tensioner spring had failed. Vehicle has only 57,000 miles. Seems excessively early for this type of part to fail.
Also reported on the 2014 Ford Explorer
Other steering problem
Other body or interior problem
Other engine problem
Steering rack, gear or tie rod failure
Exhaust leak or fumes in the cabin
Other suspension problem
How far this goes
Complaints are voluntary, so 10 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 alternator or charging system failure happen on the 2014 Ford Explorer?
Across 8 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 80,000 miles. A quarter were filed before 55,000 miles and a quarter after 105,000 miles. These are the mileages owners reported when they complained, not a prediction for any individual car.
How common is alternator or charging system failure on the 2014 Ford Explorer?
10 reports have been filed with NHTSA, about 0.0 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