Window regulator or power window failure on the 2005 Ford F-150
1 injury 1 of the 137 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 window regulator or power window failure gets reported
Owners of the 2005 Ford F-150 report window regulator or power window failure at a median of 51,000 miles. A quarter of the reports come in before 34,000 miles and a quarter after 73,000 miles, from 131 reports that carried an odometer reading.
A part like this is normally expected to survive 90,000 miles. It is the 2nd most-reported problem on this model year.
The mileage distribution
The reported range runs from 29,000 miles at the tenth percentile to 97,000 miles at the ninetieth, a spread of 67,700 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.
27% of the dated reports were filed under 36,000 miles.
The whole distribution
| 10th | 25th | Median | 75th | 90th |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 29,300 miles | 34,332 miles | 50,500 miles | 73,405 miles | 97,000 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, 1 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–$900 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 3 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 2005, at a median of 51,000 miles, and latest on the 2004 at 65,000 miles.
By volume the 2004 carries the most reports, with 410; the 2005 has 137. 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.
Normal use of my 2005 ford f-150 in the past two years has lead to a few item I believe can be a safety issue. The latest is the drivers seat breaking its lower frame and seat pad tray. Ford has yet to fix this issue as they claim parts are not available at this time. The seat is "rocking" during normal driving and is a concern of mine if it should totally fail while the vehicle is in use leading to a crash. It is also at a slight tilt causing me to sit in a very uncomfortable position. It has been a month since I took the truck in to have it repaired, but the parts are still on order to fix it. This is a un-reasonable amount of time to have to wait. Also 3 out of the five windows of my truck have broken, this results in the window regulator breaking causing the window to drop to the bottom of the door. This leaves me and my vehicle open to the weather and/or being unsecured if driving in a less than safe area. The windows have been fixed in the same day without having to wait for parts as the dealer has stated "we keep the parts available as it is a known problem". But they can not fix the other two until they break as ford will…
Normal use of my 2005 ford f-150 in the past two years has lead to a few item I believe can be a safety issue. The latest is the drivers seat breaking its lower frame and seat pad tray. Ford has yet to fix this issue as they claim parts are not available at this time. The seat is "rocking" during normal driving and is a concern of mine if it should totally fail while the vehicle is in use leading to a crash. It is also at a slight tilt causing me to sit in a very uncomfortable position. It has been a month since I took the truck in to have it repaired, but the parts are still on order to fix it. This is a un-reasonable amount of time to have to wait. Also 3 out of the five windows of my truck have broken, this results in the window regulator breaking causing the window to drop to the bottom of the door. This leaves me and my vehicle open to the weather and/or being unsecured if driving in a less than safe area. The windows have been fixed in the same day without having to wait for parts as the dealer has stated "we keep the parts available as it is a known problem". But they can not fix the other two until they break as ford will…
The front driver side window falls down into the door, while driving the vehicle, and would not roll back up. Had to have to window regulator and window motor replaced completely due to the elevator cables of the window regulator breaking. Has happened to more than one window. *tr
Also reported on the 2005 Ford F-150
Other visibility problem
Other engine problem
Other powertrain problem
Misfire or rough idle
Other electrical problem
Other brake problem
How far this goes
Complaints are voluntary, so 137 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 window regulator or power window failure happen on the 2005 Ford F-150?
Across 131 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 51,000 miles. A quarter were filed before 34,000 miles and a quarter after 73,000 miles. These are the mileages owners reported when they complained, not a prediction for any individual car.
How common is window regulator or power window failure on the 2005 Ford F-150?
137 reports have been filed with NHTSA, about 0.4 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