Engine Belts And Pulleys problems of the 2004 Ford Explorer Sport Trac

Harmonic balancer went bad may 2009, just under 19,000 miles on my 2004 st! left my family and I stranded on I-95 in philadelphia. Ford has sold a lot of replacements but won't issue recall or TSB. The serpentine jumped off the balancer pulley and landed on the rubber mount of the balancer then ate through the sensor. Jan 21, 2010: started up the st, no problem. Drove one block, stopped at stop sign. Made right turn and accelerated, then the st died; 22,000 miles. Just before it lost all power in the engine, I heard what sounded like a turbine quickly decelerating. Now I turn the key, hear the starter clicking, and nothing happens with the engine. Towed to Ford dealership. There was a rattle just before this happened. Ford service dept. Rep called me late yesterday and said it may be attributed to poor installation of harmonic balancer, possibly not torqued correctly; sounded like passing the buck. He needed permission to pull the front of the engine apart to look inside, I gave him a green light to do so. He just called today and said the "key way and sprocket" are bad. He said they come in a kit with a new timing chain; parts and labor after a friendly discount: $925. The truck is already there and apart, so I gave them the go ahead to fix it. Normal price would have been about $1100. Strange, they have a "repair kit" to fix this particular issue, but Ford says there is no problem with the engine! harmonic balancer goes bad, fix it with new and improved one. Then this happens, fix it with new and improved parts from a "repair kit"! Ford says there are no known problems with this engine!.

Started hearing a squeal like a slipping fan belt, checked it out and found the crankshaft pulley separated from the damper, the belt came off the pulley and was riding on the damper. It is now costing me $500 to have the pulley replaced, I have noticed others having this same issue, it seams that this is a defective part and Ford should be required to fix this at their cost. If I had continued to drive without getting it fixed it would have broken the crankshaft timing sensor causing engine shut down and maybe loss of vehicle control.

My truck began making loud whinning noises June 2007, the steering was very tight when using the a/c and check engine light came on, a/c did not cool or get a tight seal for air flow, front tire wear has accelerated causing shaky steering, power steering got worse, although all fluids were new and belts look worn out and with all this I only had 52,120 miles. I had wreck in 07 because of the steering and reported it to my insurance for payment. When all the problems continued to pile up and regular maintenance didn't solve anything, I took it to 3 mechanics and all said ac compressor or power steering needed replacing and other components looked prematurely worn. Finally had ac compressor repaired on 7/26/08 only to find out that the harmonic balancer was the cause of all my problems and had to be replaced as well. The mechanic gave me the parts and said it looked like a weak lego block. I have all the old parts in my trunk and even though my vehicle was repaired, it still runs bad, but the mechanic stated that the harmonic balancer is the initiator, due to poor manufacturing.