Complete transmission failure on the 2008 Ford Taurus
Only 5 reports for this mode came with an odometer reading, which is too few for percentiles to mean anything. The page is here because someone linked to it; treat the figures as anecdotes, and see the full report for this year instead.
When complete transmission failure gets reported
There are 5 reports of complete transmission failure on the 2008 Ford Taurus, 5 with a mileage attached. That is too few to place the failure on the odometer with any confidence.
A part like this is normally expected to survive 98,000 miles. It is the 11th most-reported problem on this model year.
The whole distribution
| 10th | 25th | Median | 75th | 90th |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| — | — | 118,557 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
Putting it right typically runs $2,800–$8,000 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.
This mode is classified as critical, which means a failure can leave the car unable to stop, steer, or stay out of the way of traffic. It is weighted accordingly in the risk score.
The same failure on other years
The same failure is reported on 12 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 1997, at a median of 55,000 miles, and latest on the 1998 at 135,000 miles.
By volume the 2003 carries the most reports, with 92; the 2008 has 5. 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.
On two separate occasions, my 2008 ford taurus sel automatic transmission dropped out of gear while I was accelerating slowly away from a stop and then slammed into gear. The first time it occurred I was leaving my driveway. It dropped out of gear at about 5 MPH and made a growling noise. I stopped the car, thinking somehow the shift lever wasn't in the right position, I put it in gear and the transmission slammed into first. I had my foot on the brake, so I just shifted it into neutral and turned the engine off. When I started it again everything worked fine. About a year and a half later I had a similar incident. I was leaving a parking lot and I had reached a speed of 5-15 MPH when there was no longer any gear, then it slammed into gear for a moment, went a few feet, then dropped out again, then slammed into gear again. I was able to coast to the curb in a residential area and turn the engine off. Fortunately no traffic was coming. I started the engine again and had no further trouble, but this time I took it into the ford dealer where I had bought it new. They checked it out keeping it two days but said they could find nothing…
Tl* the contact owns a 2008 ford taurus. The contact stated that while driving approximate 40 MPH, the vehicle would not accelerate. The vehicle was taken the dealer for diagnosis. The technician stated that the computer was providing incorrect codes to the transmission, resulting in a transmission failure. The technician also stated that the computer required a programming repair. The manufacturer was made aware of the failure. The vehicle was not repaired. The failure mileage was 180,000.
Tl* the contact owns a 2008 ford taurus. The contact stated that while driving approximate 40 MPH, the vehicle would not accelerate. The vehicle was taken the dealer for diagnosis. The technician stated that the computer was providing incorrect codes to the transmission, resulting in a transmission failure. The technician also stated that the computer required a programming repair. The manufacturer was made aware of the failure. The vehicle was not repaired. The failure mileage was 180,000.
Also reported on the 2008 Ford Taurus
Other powertrain problem
Other speed control problem
Steering rack, gear or tie rod failure
Other engine problem
Other steering problem
Control module (ECM/PCM/BCM) failure
How far this goes
This page is kept out of search results because 5 reports is not enough to publish percentiles from. It stays reachable because somebody looking at this exact car would rather see the reports than be told there are none.
Complaints are voluntary, so 5 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 complete transmission failure happen on the 2008 Ford Taurus?
Across 5 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 120,000 miles. A quarter were filed before — and a quarter after —. These are the mileages owners reported when they complained, not a prediction for any individual car.
How common is complete transmission failure on the 2008 Ford Taurus?
5 reports have been filed with NHTSA, about 94 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