One problem related to brake master cylinder has been reported for the 1997 Ford Escort. The most recently reported issues are listed below.
Ford brake engineers designed to brake effort proportioning the master cylinder to allocate 85-90% of the braking to the front wheels and only 10 to 15%to the rear wheels. This proportion is incorrect and results in the inability to stop the car under emergency braking situations. It is not possibly to lockup the rear wheels even with the brake pedal to the floor. When the front wheel break traction on slipery surfaces the car looses its ability to stop in a reasonable length. This miss allocation of braking effort resulted in a near rear end accident in 1997 and resulted recently in totalling the vehicle this April. This braking system should have been recalled years ago to correct the embalance of the braking action. I tried to bring this design problem to the attention of Ford motor company in 1995 but it fell on deaf ears. This is a real dangerous safety problem that should have been addressed.