Ford Explorer (2011–2019) Problems to Check Before You Bid

On a 2011–2019 Ford Explorer, check five things before you bid. Look for coolant in the oil (the 3.5L V6 water pump sits inside the engine). On AWD trucks, check for a leaking or cooked power transfer unit. Make sure the rear toe-link recalls are closed. Watch for exhaust smell in the cabin, especially on rear-hit trucks. And look for bubbling paint on the aluminum hood. Of the five, the water pump has the most power to wipe out a cheap buy, so start there.

This is the fifth-generation Explorer, the unibody truck on Ford's D4 platform built at Chicago Assembly from December 2010 to March 2019. Explorers in this range land at Copart and IAA all the time, both civilian trucks and the Police Interceptor Utility version, so it pays to know the failure list cold.

01Know which engine you're bidding on

Decode the VIN before anything else. The fifth gen came with:

• 3.5L Duratec V6 (290 hp), the standard engine and the one most of these trucks have
• 2.0L EcoBoost four-cylinder, front-wheel drive only, early years
• 2.3L EcoBoost four-cylinder, later years
• 3.5L EcoBoost twin-turbo V6, AWD only (Sport and Platinum)
• 3.7L V6, Police Interceptor Utility only

Every one of them runs a 6-speed automatic. Drive type matters as much as engine: AWD trucks carry the power transfer unit covered below, and FWD trucks don't.

021. The internal water pump (3.5L and 3.7L V6)

This is the big one. On the naturally aspirated 3.5L V6 (and the 3.7L in the police trucks), the water pump sits behind the timing cover and the timing chain drives it. When the pump's seal goes, coolant doesn't drip on the ground. It runs into the engine oil.

Coolant in the oil kills bearings fast. If the owner kept driving, you're buying an engine, not a water pump.

Caught early, it's still expensive because the timing side of the engine has to come apart. Published shop quotes run roughly $2,000 to $4,500 for the pump job (as of October 2026), and owners have posted bills well past that once the engine was hurt. There's no recall on it.

What to check at the yard:

• Pull the dipstick and the oil cap. Milky, tan, or chocolate-milk oil means coolant has gotten in. Clean, dark oil is what you want to see.
• Coolant reservoir level. Low or empty with no wet spots under the truck is a bad sign on this engine.
• Listing history. "Engine damage" or "mechanical" as the primary damage on a V6 Explorer with a clean body often means this failure.
• Mileage. A V6 truck past 100,000 miles with no record of the pump being done is a pump waiting to fail. Price the job into your bid either way.

If the oil is milky, bid it as a parts car or engine swap, not a runner. Used 3.5L engines are easy to find through Car-Part.com and the big yards. Just know the replacement has the same pump inside it.

032. The power transfer unit on AWD trucks

On AWD Explorers, the PTU sends power to the rear driveshaft. It sits right next to the exhaust and catalytic converter and holds only about half a quart of gear oil. Ford sold it as lifetime fill, with no dipstick and no drain plug. The heat cooks the oil, the seals start leaking, and eventually the gears go.

Signs on the lot:

• A burnt, sulfur-like gear-oil smell near the front of the truck after it's been running
• Wet, oily residue on the PTU and the exhaust below it
• Grinding, whining, or shudder on a run-and-drive truck when it pulls away

A seal job caught early runs about $200 to $500. A full PTU replacement runs roughly $2,000 to $3,100 (as of October 2026). If you buy one and keep it, change the PTU fluid regularly. Owners and parts sellers suggest about every 30,000 miles.

043. Rear toe links and the open recalls

The rear toe links on this truck have been recalled more than once, and the recalls are still going.

• 2019 (Ford 19S17): about 1.2 million 2011–2017 Explorers in the U.S. built at Chicago Assembly through January 25, 2017. A fractured toe link can cut steering control badly. Dealers replace both links and align the rear.
• 2020–2021: more expansions, including one aimed at trucks sold or registered in salt states. There, road salt can seize the cross-axis ball joint and crack the outer part of the link. A July 2021 recall covered roughly 775,000 more Explorers.
• February 2026 (Ford 26S08, NHTSA 26V101): more than 412,000 2017–2019 Explorers with a ball-joint and toe-link combination built between May 16, 2017 and March 3, 2019. NHTSA's filing says some trucks already repaired under earlier recalls have to go back for the new fix.

With fall here and salt trucks about to roll in a lot of the country, a salt-belt Explorer with an open toe-link recall is worth checking twice.

What to do:

1. Run the VIN at NHTSA's recall lookup before you bid. Then run it through a history report too.
2. Look at the rear wheels from behind. A rear wheel tipped in or out more than its partner can mean a cracked or bent link, or rear-end hit damage.
3. Call a Ford dealer with the VIN and ask whether they'll do open recalls on a salvage or rebuilt title. Get the answer before you count on a free fix.

054. Exhaust smell in the cabin

NHTSA spent six years on complaints about exhaust odor and carbon monoxide in 2011–2017 Explorers, more than 6,500 complaints in all. The agency closed the case in 2023 without a recall. Stock trucks, measured correctly, came in under accepted health limits.

The part that matters at auction is where the highest levels came from. NHTSA traced them to sealing problems from police upfitting and, in consumer trucks, from rear crash damage. Ford also ran a service action (17B25) that resealed police trucks and added exhaust downturns.

So a rear-hit Explorer is the one most likely to pull fumes into the cabin after it's fixed. On any rear-damage truck:

• Plan to reseal the rear body seams, liftgate area, and any cut or bent panels. Don't just bolt on a bumper.
• Check the tailpipe angle and the exhaust hangers after the repair.
• Put a cheap CO detector in the cabin on your test drive with the HVAC on recirculate and the windows up.

See how to judge a truck you can't drive for what you can learn from photos and a yard walk when you can't take it out.

065. Bubbling paint on the aluminum hood

Explorer hoods are aluminum, and they're known for paint bubbling and flaking, usually starting along the front edge and the perimeter. Ford put out several service bulletins on it for 2000–2017 Explorers, including TSB 17-0062 in August 2017, which told dealers to replace corroded aluminum panels. A 2019 class-action suit over it was dismissed in 2021.

It doesn't affect how the truck drives, but it hurts resale. Buyers see a bubbling hood and assume the whole truck is rotten. Budget for a used hood in good paint or a refinish. Hail on an aluminum hood is its own question; hail vs. wrecked trucks covers that math.

076. Transmission shudder

The 6-speed automatic in these trucks has plenty of owner complaints about shudder and harsh or hesitant shifts. The usual suspects are the torque converter and the shift solenoids, and Ford put out software updates for some of it. How common real failures are is hard to pin down from good sources, so treat it as a check, not a deal-breaker:

• On a run-and-drive, listen and feel for a shudder under light throttle around 30–45 mph.
• Dark or burnt-smelling fluid on a high-mileage truck means you should set your max bid lower.

08Police Interceptor Utility trucks

Retired PIUs show up at auction all the time, cheap. They use the 3.7L V6 (or EcoBoost in some), which has the same internal water pump issue, and they spent their lives idling. That wear doesn't show on the odometer. Upfit holes in the body and roof are what caused the worst exhaust-odor readings, so check that every hole is sealed. Price a PIU as a work truck, not a family SUV.

09Before you set your number

• Decode the VIN: engine, FWD or AWD, police or civilian
• Oil cap and dipstick: no milky oil
• Coolant reservoir: full, no unexplained loss
• AWD: no wet PTU, no burnt gear-oil smell
• NHTSA recall lookup: toe-link recalls closed, including the 2026 expansion
• Rear wheels: square, no odd tilt
• Rear damage: budget for sealing, not just panels
• Hood: bubbling paint means a hood in the budget

Then put the water pump or PTU risk into your max-bid sheet as a real dollar line. A V6 Explorer that needs a $3,000 pump job isn't a cheap truck anymore. If you're also pricing Ford pickups, the F-150 checklist works the same way.

Related: Buying a Salvage Tesla? Autopilot, FSD and Supercharging May Not Come With It · Toyota Tundra (2014–2021) Problems to Check Before You Bid

Sources (6)

• Go-Parts: Ford 3.5L/3.7L internal water pump, 2011–2019
• Go-Parts: Explorer and Ford AWD PTU failure
• TFLcar: 2011–2017 Explorer toe-link recall 19S17
• CarComplaints: Explorer toe-link recall expanded (2026)
• Carscoops: NHTSA closes Explorer exhaust probe
• Ford Authority: Explorer hood corrosion lawsuit dismissed

Photo: 2015 Ford Explorer XLT in Tuxedo Black Metallic, front right, 05-20-2026 by Cutlass, CC0.