Many customers choose their Ford vehicles by selecting the optimum combination of performance, price, and style. Often that means compromising between a top-of-the-line vehicle and more practical considerations. But even customers choosing the most powerful Fords may find that they want to squeeze a little more performance from their vehicles. Before you do, however, make sure you know how to keep your Ford warranty intact.
How to Keep Your Ford Warranty Intact
By modifying a car’s factory components, it is sometimes possible to see dramatic gains in engine output or other functions. But if you’re going to go to work on your car for any reason, you’ll want to do so carefully so that you don’t risk voiding the manufacturer’s warranty.
This process has two parts: ensuring that your vehicle components come from Ford and finding a properly certified technician.
Ford Performance Parts
The first step is to order your upgraded vehicle components directly from Ford itself. The manufacturer operates a performance-based division of its company, aptly named Ford Performance. This division aims to “create unique performance vehicles, parts, accessories, and experiences for customers.” Ford Performance generates equipment that can upgrade a vehicle’s aerodynamics, electronic systems, powertrains, and fuel efficiency. The best part is that these upgraded parts are covered by the vehicle’s original warranty when they are installed by a certified technician.
For example, a supercharger is an air compressor that allows a vehicle’s engine to take in more oxygen, thereby burning more fuel and generating more power. Ford Performance manufactures superchargers, such as the one recently developed for the 2018 Ford Mustang. This supercharger is rated at 700 horsepower and is capable of providing up to 610 pounds per foot of torque. The upgrade is also available for the 2018 Ford F-150, for which it generates 640 horsepower and 600 pounds per foot of torque.
Other Ford Performance parts include short throw shifters, entirely new exhaust systems, and recalibrated engine controllers. When combining multiple upgrades in this manner, you can add significant horsepower to your vehicle’s engine.
Technician Certification
The National Institute for Automotive Service Excellence, or ASE, is a group that certifies technicians and mechanics who are qualified to administer complicated vehicle repair jobs. If you are looking to upgrade your factory Ford vehicle, it’s important to verify that your technician possesses an ASE certification. If the installation of your vehicle modification causes any damage to the car’s systems, the damage will be covered under the vehicle warranty—as long as the technician is ASE-certified. This is true even if the upgrades are genuine Ford Performance components, so this is a step you won’t want to skip.
An important thing to keep in mind when upgrading your Ford is to consider the cost of individual upgrades. Performance-based upgrades can easily cost several hundred dollars per part, for a total cost figuring in the thousands of dollars. They also won’t fundamentally change the design of your vehicle, as they’re only capable of enhancing what’s already there. But if you’re in the market for these advanced vehicle components, you’re sure to enjoy the benefits they can deliver, such as increased horsepower and tighter handling.
“Ford” by EME used under license CC0
