How Many identical Paint Issues Equals a Paint Recall?

[Carolina Jeeper]

At this point I've had one door repaired that had paint bubbling around the door hinges. Since then I keep a close watch on the key areas known to have bubbling. This week I found bubbling paint on the leading edge of the hood. I can also see early signs on the inside edge at the door seams of two doors. I've observed it expanding over the last three months.

This is a major issue and needs a major corrective action from Jeep or whatever the Hell they call themselves these days.

Anyone with common sense knows that this is unacceptable on multiple levels.

What's worse is they are 100% aware of the cause and how to resolve it, but those new Jeep Wranglers keep rolling out of the factory missing paint under their hinges.

I just don't understand.

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[jludave]

Lemon laws vary by state. And, I believe the issue has to be on the same part/component multiple times. Not sure if paint issues in different locations qualifies. Best bet is to contact an attorney that specializes in lemon law for your state.

 

[ThirtyOne]

I doubt they would do a recall if it is not a safety issue.

 

[Carolina Jeeper]

This may or may not fall within the lemon law. I'll clarify on my original statement. Hundreds or even thousands of different wrangler with identical paint issues instead of just one wrangler with many identical paint issues. I'm not sure what terminology fits this. Recall, TSB, etc...? It's been done before. I remember Dodge purchasing trucks back from owners and replacing with another new truck at no cost to owners for paint issues. All of them had identical paint issues in a particular VIN range. This was in the 90's. Oldsmobile repainted thousands of entire cars in the 80'S.

 

[Odyssey USA]

There have been issues across the board here and there for years with bubbling on aluminum panels. My first experience was a Mustang. You would think they’d have it figured out by now.

 

[jludave]

It’s not a safety issue, so a recall is not likely to happen. A TSB might if, and this is a big if, enough owners keep bringing their vehicles in for paint issues under warranty.

As mentioned, your best bet is looking into your state’s lemon law if your vehicle has been back to the dealer for that many paint issues.

 

[Crawldad]

i've owned many jeeps and none of them had paint under the hinges, so i dont get this gripe.

i get the bubbles part. problem is, aluminum as well as stainless steel do not take paint primer adhesion as well as regular steel.

so going all aluminum on the doors to save weight (saving weight increases MPG) was the big mistake. hoods being aluminum are not as bad because you dont open and close the hood every time you drive the car. door hinges take a lot of abuse, so the areas of the aluminum around the hinges are constantly experiencing microscopic amounts of flex.

 

[Sublime]

I'm failing to see why there is such a problem with painting aluminum at auto manufacturers.
We've been using Kenworth trucks for decades, the cabs have been aluminum the entire time. They have to get to be 10 years old and a million miles or more before we see any corrosion. Hell the one in my profile pic is an '89, all aluminum, 425k miles on it, no corrosion.

 

[Carolina Jeeper]

i've owned many jeeps and none of them had paint under the hinges, so i dont get this gripe.

i get the bubbles part. problem is, aluminum as well as stainless steel do not take paint primer adhesion as well as regular steel.

so going all aluminum on the doors to save weight (saving weight increases MPG) was the big mistake. hoods being aluminum are not as bad because you dont open and close the hood every time you drive the car. door hinges take a lot of abuse, so the areas of the aluminum around the hinges are constantly experiencing microscopic amounts of flex.

I've owned three wranglers total in 11 years and only this one is experiencing the bubbling paint issue.

Can't blame the door paint issue on a use related theory. The door I had an issue with almost never gets used so it's not related to amount of use. So, I'm not buying those apples.

This "gripe" is not subjective. It's poor quality, period and not an opinion. If someone has no problem with poor quality then that's fine and still does not change the fact that it's poor quality.

Like was stated, those commercial trucks have been using aluminum body's including doors for decades and not experiencing this bubbling door paint in a 1 or 2 year old vehicle. I worked on these trucks too and they ranged from late 80's through 2015 and only rarely saw some aluminum corrosion on a few older trucks. But typically commercial trucking industry uses very powerful soaps when they wash them after experiencing hundreds of hours of salt covered roads each year. And yet still see very minimal corrosion.

It's a quality related problem and needs someone in Jeep's leadership to step up and fix it. Those old days of its a common Jeep problem so just accept it and get over it are over.

Those higher prices they demand for these Wranglers also demand higher quality.

 

[The Pointer]

How long has Ford been using aluminum panels and painting them without trouble?

 

[Carolina Jeeper]

How long has Ford been using aluminum panels and painting them without trouble?

Ford has been using an aluminum body for the F150 since 2015.

 

[Redneck_Jedi]

It’s not a safety issue, so a recall is not likely to happen. A TSB might if, and this is a big if, enough owners keep bringing their vehicles in for paint issues under warranty.

As mentioned, your best bet is looking into your state’s lemon law if your vehicle has been back to the dealer for that many paint issues.

Honestly, I'm not sure we can rule this out as a possible safety issue. If we are seeing corrosion on the exterior body panels (like the doors), it seems likely that corrosion is also occurring inside those panels where paint coverage is even worse -like on the Door Intrusion Beams.

 

[mwilk012]

Honestly, I'm not sure we can rule this out as a possible safety issue. If we are seeing corrosion on the exterior body panels (like the doors), it seems likely that corrosion is also occurring inside those panels where paint coverage is even worse -like on the Door Intrusion Beams.

Good luck with that case. It ain't happening.

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