Other engine problem on the 2000 Mercury Mountaineer
5 fires 5 of the 7 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.
Only 6 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 other engine problem gets reported
There are 7 reports of other engine problem on the 2000 Mercury Mountaineer, 6 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 95,000 miles. It is the 6th most-reported problem on this model year.
The whole distribution
| 10th | 25th | Median | 75th | 90th |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| — | — | 174,173 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, 5 a fire 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 $300–$4,000 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.
The same failure on other years
The same failure is reported on 9 model years of this car. It shows up earliest on the 2008, at a median of 25,000 miles, and latest on the 2000 at 175,000 miles.
By volume the 2002 carries the most reports, with 14; the 2000 has 7. 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.
Tl* the contact owns a 2000 mercury mountaineer. The contact stated that smoke emitted from under the hood area. The contact inspected the vehicle and noticed black smoke and flames in the engine area. The fire department was contacted to extinguish the fire. The vehicle was towed to the contact's insurance company for further investigation. The vehicle was not repaired. The manufacturer was not made aware of the failure. The failure and current mileage was 165,000. Updated 06/26/13*lj the consumer believed the speed control deactivation switch was the cause of the fire. Updated 06/27/13 *bf updated updated 07/02/2013 *js
Tl* the contact owned a 2000 mercury mountaineer. While driving approximately 65 MPH, fuel fumes emitted into the vehicle and the engine began to smoke before it caught fire. The check engine indicator illuminated. The fire department was able to extinguish the fire. The vehicle was towed to the contact's residence. The vehicle was deemed destroyed. The manufacturer was not notified of the failure. The approximate failure mileage was 240,000.
I was driving don the road to an intersection going 45 MPH and noticed black smoke coming from under the hood. I proceeded to pull over and got my family out the car before the electrical was completely fried. I tried to put the fire out with two extinguishers and help from fellow bystanders. The blaze under the hood had to be put out by the fire department. I received a police and fire report. The area that the fire had originated from was the fuse box. I know this was a factory problem because I didn't do any work in those areas. I would like compensation for my vehicle because I'm now out 6500 dollars and I searched online and read about over a 100 explorer and mountaineer fires under the hood. I never received any recalls for my vehicle and I owned it over 10 years. *tr
Also reported on the 2000 Mercury Mountaineer
Other speed control problem
Other wheel or tire problem
Other electrical problem
Other body or interior problem
Other powertrain problem
Door latch or handle failure
How far this goes
This page is kept out of search results because 7 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 7 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 engine problem happen on the 2000 Mercury Mountaineer?
Across 6 owner reports that included an odometer reading, half were filed by 175,000 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 other engine problem on the 2000 Mercury Mountaineer?
7 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