Ford recalled numerous vehicles for a manufacturing defect in passenger air bag inflators.   The vehicles include the 1995 Ford Countour, 1995 Ford Crown Victoria, 1995 Ford Explorer, 1995 Ford Mustang, 1995 Ford Probe, 1995 Ford Windstar, 1995 Lincoln Town Car, 1995 Mercury Grand Marquis, and the 1995 Mercury Mystique.

The manufacturing defect resulted in the inflator being cracked during the process of securing the igniter inside the inflator.  This can cause two different safety problems if the airbag inflates during an accident.  First, the passenger airbag may not inflate properly, since some of the gas will escape from the inflator and will not fully pressurize the bag.  Second, those hot gases that escape can cause burn injuries to a consumer and can ignite flammable materials, resulting in a fire.

The inflator manufacturers are required to conduct certain quality control testing for every batch of airbag inflators.  That testing includes “lot acceptance testing”; parts are not supposed to be shipped from the supplier’s airbag manufacturing facility until those tests are successfully passed.  There are also other quality controls and process control standards that are supposed to be met before those parts are shipped.

This is yet another instance where, despite promises of strict quality control, defects are not caught during the production process.  This means the defective parts are not identified, and are instead installed into consumers’ vehicles.

The government’s recall number is 95E-006002.