Other visibility problem on the 2000 Ford Focus
2 crashes 2 fires 2 injuries 1 death 7 of the 71 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 other visibility problem gets reported
Owners of the 2000 Ford Focus report other visibility problem at a median of 65,000 miles. A quarter of the reports come in before 45,000 miles and a quarter after 90,000 miles, from 19 reports that carried an odometer reading.
A part like this is normally expected to survive 75,000 miles. It is the 19th most-reported problem on this model year.
The mileage distribution
The reported range runs from 40,000 miles at the tenth percentile to 105,000 miles at the ninetieth, a spread of 66,962 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.
11% of the dated reports were filed under 36,000 miles.
The whole distribution
| 10th | 25th | Median | 75th | 90th |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 38,800 miles | 43,500 miles | 62,500 miles | 88,000 miles | 105,762 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 crash, 2 a fire, 2 an injury and 1 a fatality are 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 $150–$1,400 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 16 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 2015, at a median of 5,000 miles, and latest on the 2008 at 125,000 miles.
By volume the 2000 is the worst of them, which makes this a problem of this specific year rather than of the model as a whole.
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.
Power windows on 2000 ford focus fail often. I have heard of this problem on many other foci via the internet; but I have personally had 3 power windows fail (which is a safety concern, as windows fall down violent when they fail and remain down, cannot be rolled up and will not stay up if moved by hand leaving vehicle exposed to theft and the elements) in less than 3 years... Two of which have failed out of warranty. (warranty is up in one month time frame; but have driven vehicle 45,000 miles.) consumers are seriously getting bitten by the cost of replacing ford's faulty designed power window assemblies. Date of most recent incident given. *jb
Takes off real hard like it wants to die but won't, then stops. When car is ran for a while it starts doing. We are not the only focus with this problem. There are others along with their reverse going out or first gear. Every one who takes it in doesn't get it fixed
In january of this year, my power locks stoped working so I brought my car to the ford shop where they replaced the latch assembly, handle, cable, and fuse in the back driver side door. $350 all together. The locks worked fine for about 2 months when they suddenly went out again. At that time I couldn't open the back door at all. Not even manually. I lived with it for a while but then the front passenger side door did the same thing so with only two doors opening, I brought it back to the ford shop. They fixed the back door again for free since the previous work was still under warranty. The front door however needed the same as the back and the trunk button also needed to be replaced. The quote was for $475. I couldn't afford that at the time and decided to wait a little longer. In the meantime, the window on the same back door suddenly fell into the door and had to be held up with some folded paper until I could bring it in. The quote for the front door as well as the window was over $700.00! They said the regulator broke so the window wouldn't stay up. Apparently that is in some other part of the door because they said it was…
Also reported on the 2000 Ford Focus
Other electrical problem
Ignition switch, key fob or immobilizer failure
Other engine problem
Fuel pump failure
Other body or interior problem
Other brake problem
How far this goes
Complaints are voluntary, so 71 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 other visibility problem happen on the 2000 Ford Focus?
Across 19 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 65,000 miles. A quarter were filed before 45,000 miles and a quarter after 90,000 miles. These are the mileages owners reported when they complained, not a prediction for any individual car.
How common is other visibility problem on the 2000 Ford Focus?
71 reports have been filed with NHTSA, about 0.2 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