California Injury Blog
Ford Motor Co. is recalling more than 100,000 of its 2008 F-Series trucks because of a flaw in the driver’s seat, consumer watchdog Web site, Consumeraffairs.com reports. Ford officials are saying that the weld connecting the driver’s front seat back with a bracket can crack. Because of this faulty weld, the vehicles do not meet with federal rules for seatback strength, the article said.
The recalls cover F-250 through F-550 Super Duty trucks. There are more than 87,000 of the trucks here in the United States and about 14,000 in Canada with these defective seatbacks. Ford says no injuries have been reported yet because of the defective product. Owners will be notified of the defect later in March.
Seatback defects are serious problems and can cause major injuries or death even in low-speed, rear-end collisions. The mechanics of it are important to understand. When a vehicle is hit from behind, the force of the impact propels the vehicle forward and the occupants are thrown backwards.
We recently filed a defective seatback lawsuit against the Nissan Motor Co. where our client was thrown back after the driver’s seat broke and suffered severe head injuries. The seatback should be able to keep the vehicle’s occupants safe by protecting them from ejection and from striking parts of the vehicle’s interior or ramming into other passengers. It should be able to keep the occupants in an upright position.
We have also settled successfully with Ford in the past over seatback defect issues. In many of its vehicles, Ford denied its fault saying that there was nothing wrong with their seatbacks. That denial has cost a lot of lives. We’re glad that at least this time around, they admitted the fault and are working toward recalling and repairing the vehicles.