2002 Mercury Sable at 75,650 miles
You did not give a mileage, so this uses 75,650 — the median reported failure mileage for this model year, which is a rough stand-in for “a typical example of this car”. Put your real reading in the box below for an answer about your car.
At 75,650 miles on this car
At 75,650 miles on a 2002 Mercury Sable, 22 of the failure modes other owners have reported already have their median report at or below your reading, and 4 more fall inside the window where they are usually reported. The heaviest of the ones already due is other engine problem.
Already past the median 22
Half of all reports of these failures came in at or below where your car is now.
- Other engine problem 51k
- Other body or interior problem 56k
- Other powertrain problem 34k
- Blower motor or climate control failure 63k
- Other brake problem 32k
- Other visibility problem 64k
- Airbag failed to deploy in a crash 33k
- Other electrical problem 54k
- ABS module or sensor failure 75k
- Other lighting problem 69k
- Complete transmission failure 50k
- Other wheel or tire problem 55k
10 more.
You are in the window 4
Your reading falls inside the middle half of reports for these.
Typically later 13
Reported further down the road than where you are.
- Parking brake failure 76k
- Head gasket failure 83k
- Loss of braking 87k
- Tail light, brake light or signal failure 90k
- Brake line, hose or caliper failure 93k
- Fuel pump failure 94k
- Other fuel system problem 96k
- Master cylinder or brake booster failure 97k
- Air conditioning failure 99k
- Overheating 100k
- Fuel injector failure 120k
- Rust or structural corrosion 134k
1 more.
Timing unknown 4
Reported, but too few owners gave an odometer reading to place them.
- Torque converter failure 1×
- Control module (ECM/PCM/BCM) failure 1×
- Sunroof failure or glass breakage 1×
- Other driver assistance problem 1×
Why the list is generic until you type a number
Every figure below is a comparison against your odometer, so with no reading given the page has to pick one: 75,650 miles, roughly what a 2002 car covers at 12,000 miles a year. A reading 30,000 miles either side of that moves failures between the columns, which is the difference between a useful list and a generic one.
Already inside the reported range
22 failure modes on the 2002 Mercury Sable have a median reported mileage at or below 75,650: other engine problem (median 50,000 miles, 18 reports), other body or interior problem (median 55,000 miles, 17 reports), other powertrain problem (median 35,000 miles, 16 reports), blower motor or climate control failure (median 65,000 miles, 15 reports), other brake problem (median 30,000 miles, 13 reports) and other visibility problem (median 65,000 miles, 13 reports).
Half the owners who reported each of these had done so by that mileage, which means half had not. A failure being "due" here is a statement about other people's cars, and the useful response is an inspection rather than a pre-emptive repair.
The window you are in now
4 further modes are reported in a band that includes 75,650 miles: strut, shock or spring failure (60k to 99,000 miles), other suspension problem (67k to 97,500 miles), other speed control problem (37k to 127,500 miles) and cruise control failure (58k to 120,000 miles). These are the ones to watch on this car over the next few thousand miles.
A window here is the 25th to 75th percentile of reported mileages, so it holds the middle half of the reports and excludes the tails on both sides.
Still ahead of you
13 further modes sit above your reading, the nearest being parking brake failure at a median of 75,000 miles. On a car you intend to keep, these are the ones that decide whether it is worth keeping.
What this list is not
It is a reading of what owners of other 2002 Mercury Sables reported, and at what odometer reading they reported it. It is not a maintenance schedule, not a diagnosis, and not a prediction about this car: two identical cars with different service histories are not the same car.
Complaints are filed voluntarily, mileages are typed in by owners and cluster on round numbers, and a failure mode with few reports has a wide window even when the median looks precise. Modes with fewer than 8 dated reports are shown without percentiles for that reason.
Where 75,650 miles falls on the curve
The three columns above sort the failure modes one by one. This is the same evidence in aggregate: every dated report on this model year, stacked up in the order the odometer readings arrived. The dashed line marked you is where your car sits. How much of the line is to the left of that mark is how much of this model year's reported trouble is, on the evidence, already behind you.
About 41% of the dated reports on this model year had already been filed by 75,650 miles. That is the share of the problems that show up in this record, not of the problems this car will have. A further 3 reports came in above the top of the scale, which is why the line stops short of the top.
- Line share of reports filed by that mileage
- Dashed the mileages called out above
A steep early climb means a car whose reports cluster young, which is the pattern of a defect rather than of wear. A line that only gets going past six figures is the opposite. Neither shape says anything about the specific car in your driveway, and a curve built from a few dozen readings can be moved by one owner with a talkative afternoon.
Full report for the 2002 Mercury Sable Compare with another car
Questions this page answers
What should I expect at 75,650 miles on a 2002 Mercury Sable?
22 of the failure modes owners have reported on the 2002 Mercury Sable have a median report at or below 75,650 miles, and 4 more fall inside the mileage window where they are usually reported. That is a watch list drawn from other owners, not a prediction about this car.
How to use the three columns. The left column is the list to hand a mechanic before you buy, and to check the service history for if you already own the car. The middle column is what to budget for this year. The right column is not a reprieve — it is a reminder that a used car has a bill schedule, and this is roughly where it falls. All of it is drawn from 541 owner complaints about this exact model year, not from a maintenance manual. How the percentiles are computed.
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