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First Bronco Sport and now Navigator. Did Farley open up the checkbook to Motor Trend?

Not bad to win the segment *before* your MCE hits...

There's also this helpful comparison from my electric coop: In Oklahoma, we are accustomed to extreme summer temperatures. To put this storm in context, keeping a house at 72 degrees when it is -5 degrees outside is equivalent to cooling a house to 72 degrees when it is 149 degrees outside. In short, in this cold, you're comparing trying to maintain a 77*F temperature differential today with trying to maintain a 25-35*F temperature differential in August. That's gonna take a much bigger energy expenditure.

I would not bet on everything being EV after 2025 unless Ford wants to cede massive market share. IMHO the automakers behind the scenes see EVs as a good part of their lineup overall, but not the he all end all many are saying. Talk of "all electric futures" excites the greenies and gets Wall Street wet, but the market very well decide different.

Just like you keep parroting that the 1.5 I3 Ecoboost is rough in its applications, Autonomous is still a pipe dream that will be lucky to be viable when I can't drive any more (which is like 35-40 years from now)

"Commit to and own segments" has been the directive for a while now and as a whole their portfolio is as competitive as it's ever been. The market is too fragmented and the margins too thin for half-effort "placeholder" products. Escape is getting sorted in short order and there's a bit of fog around the planned Fusion / Edge / Nautilus, but otherwise the lineup is really, really well executed.

He opened the checkbook to let the engineers and designers do their thing... and probably a few comp'd martini lunches with the MT folks.

Bingo. I'm tired of pointing out legitimate flaws with politically motivated proposals or propaganda and being dismissed outright or labeled as uncaring or some other derogatory label. Doing things that don't make sense just because it makes us feel better is stupid and needs to stop.

Is this Farley publicly reprimanding the North America product planning team? 😄 Just about everyone have observed that Puma is a much more appropriate car for the US market than EcoSport (or Fiesta for that matter). If Kia can sell 100k Soul a year in the US, I'm sure Ford can figure out there is a market for Puma.

Power generation is a real mess lately. Coal is under fire from all sides and plants are shutting down permanently left and right. Nuclear is having a hard time competing with natural gas plants on cost and are shutting down permanently despite being far better suited for baseload operation than gas is. Meanwhile the govt incentive money keeps flowing to wind and solar, even to the point of building it where it's not needed just to collect the incentive money. Then more nat gas plants are thrown up in the background, out of site and with no fanfare since they're not "clean", to make up for the gaps in wind/solar and to backfill the coal and nuke plants that have shut down. It all works well enough that consumers (voters) don't notice until a good cold spell hits deep into the midwest. Then the windmills freeze and all the gas is diverted to heating needs. Next thing you know it's rolling brownouts, people freezing, and entire industries shutting down due to lack of natural gas or electricty. But yeah, let's just throw a bunch of EV load in too. I'm sure it'll all work out great.

Picked up January 2021. Ecoboost 101A package and auto. 2nd one we've had. First one was a 2004 GT Premium bought new in 2003. Drove that year round until 2015. Snow tires and bags of salt in the trunk in the winter. It was a long 5 years with out a Mustang around, so happy to have one again!

So according to some dealer notices and FAQs, the following is true: After all the orders are in after March 19th, vehicles that are buildable will be selected for production based on the reservation timestamp. Priority (other than 99 which means hold) is meaningless. So yes, if a buyer moves his reservation to a new dealer that could absolutely bump an existing buyer at that dealership. It's no different than if that customer picked that dealer originally. The initial allocation estimates were based on 30% of reservations prior to the cutoff date (forgot the exact order date). The actual allocations will be done after March 19th and will be based 50% on actual orders, 25% on past SUV sales and 25% on local market Wrangler and 4runner sales. This SEEMS to indicate that a buyer with a later timestamp at a big dealer in a big Wrangler/4runner market might get their Bronco before an earlier timestamp at a different dealer. I understand why Ford is doing it this way but I don't like it. They should take all the orders, decide what they can build for 2021 MY, draw the line and build them in timestamp order. Period.

She looked just like Shania Twain except for her face. And her body was different too. - Larry the Cable Guy

Wouldn't that mean the Gladiator and Ridgeline are the class leaders? That's like saying the Yugo was the best car in it's class except for everything that was better.

talk about full service...

Full range commercial vehicles zero emission capable by 2024, and 2/3 EV or PHEV by 2030. That means 2023 Ranger will launch with a PHEV version for sure. But "capable" just means it will be an option. Full range passenger vehicles EV or PHEV by 2026, and 100% EV by 2030. No wheasel words here like "capable". So that means Ford will only launch new EV and PHEV in Europe from this point on. Just to elaborate some more on timing... you can see why Ford is putting out the 2024, 2026, and 2030 dates. Ford Europe's entire van and pickup line up are due for refresh in 2021-22 time frame so they all launch with optional PHEV or EV by 2024. Fiesta, Focus, Kuga, Puma, and Explorer are due for replacement by 2026 so they will go EV-only by that time. Mondeo and Mustang are launching with PHEV in 2021-23 timeframe and the following generation will be EV only which will launch by 2030. These are the Ford vehicles for sale in Europe now and their life cycle: Commercial Transit Courier - launched in 2014, due for replacement soon (probably B2 with PHEV option?) Transit Connect - launched in 2013, due for replacement soon (MQB VW Caddy clone with PHEV option) Transit Custom - launched in 2012, due for replacement soon (existing platform with PHEV and EV upgrade) Transit - launched in 2013, due for replacement soon (existing platform with PHEV and EV upgrade) Ranger - launched in 2011, due for replacement in 2022 (T6 with PHEV and EV upgrade) Passenger Fiesta - launched in 2017, due for replacement in 2024 (MEB) Focus - launched in 2018, due for replacement in 2025 (MEB) Mondeo - launched in 2013 (but really 2006), due for replacement in 2021 (C2 PHEV), and all-new EV only by 2028~29 Mustang - launched in 2015, due for replacement in 2023 (S650 PHEV), and all-new EV only by 2029~30 EcoSport - launched in 2012, due for replacement yesterday but probably will not be replaced at all Puma - launched in 2020, due for replacement in 2026 or 27 (MEB?) Kuga - launched in 2019, due for replacement in 2026 (probably MEB) MACH E - launched in 2021, due for replacement in 2028 (next gen Ford EV platform) Explorer - launched in 2019, due for replacement in 2026 (probably next gen Ford EV platform) S-Max - launched in 2015, probably won't be replaced Galaxy - launched in 2015 probably won't be replaced

Agreed!, if the CEO is tweeting this then I think that’s a good indicator that it will replace the stale Ecosport.

Another one that flew under the radar this week... Ford officially terminated its stillborn joint venture with Zotye, the ethically challenged and now bankrupt Chinese car company. https://www.reuters.com/article/us-fordmotor-china-zotye/ford-motor-terminates-electric-vehicle-plans-with-chinas-zotye-idUSKBN2A409A Hackett initially wanted to use Zotye Ford to build cheap EVs based on Zotye designs for local sale, a strategy that other foreign car companies (VW, Toyota, Nissan) also tried and all failed. That idea when nowhere after Ford got a closer look at what Zotye had to offer and concluded they didn't have any EV technology to leverage. Later, Hackett tried to redirect Zotye Ford to build some sort of vehicles for ride share services in China. It was supposed to tie in with development for next gen Transit Connect and the autonomous driving van. That went nowhere after Ford cancelled next gen Transit Connect in favor of rebadged VW Caddy. And then Zotye, which was best known for selling cheaply made "VW inspired" SUVs got embroiled in some sort of scandal about false financial reports. And then came COVID which other Chinese car companies survived (and are now back to full speed) but not Zotye. It's amazing that Ford was even linked up with this company in the first place. So now Farley has dissolved both Zotye and Mahindra joint ventures and scuttled Ford South America, the three things that Hackett thought was the salvation for Ford's emerging market cheap cars problem.

No rumor. Hau Thai-Tang said it. Listen to the earnings call.

I expected the Escalade to win.

I think this test really validates Ford's decision to use 3.5 EB as the only engine for Navigator. Cadillac lost mainly because its 6.2 V8 can't keep up with the endless power of Lincoln.

"Goverments" are the last group i would ever trust to fix anything....

I live 10 minutes from Costco and generally buy my gas there. I paid 2.99 for premium yesterday. Over the summer, it had been as low as 2.25. Our fuel tax ( state and county) adds a decent amount. I don’t like the gas tax but wouldn’t mind it so much if they...actually fixed the roads.

Maybe if we're good, they'll raise the fuel tax too. I'm just so thankful for the privilege to pay taxes 😇

You're welcome.