Harley Lover

Ford better make damn sure their IP is protected (I am confident they will do so). If GM couldn't trust Magna and the Russians, I'm hard pressed to see how Ford could philosphically make the jump to trust Geely.

Aside from the points mentioned by the other posters, the manufacturers have no choice but to go this direction, due to fuel economy and pollution regs coming in the middle of the decade. Factor in the traditional razor thin margin on this size car, and "dolling up" what has traditionally been regarded as an economy car makes even more sense to them, since all the add ons are meant to substantially raise the transaction price.

"Concepts" under Mullaly have been hewing much closer to the production model than in the past. I guess we can hope!

Might we see a Lincoln version of the Escape/Kuga? Or is it too early?

The union members deserve, and should expect, fair treatment. They should not expect parity. That's just the reality of life. Frankly, it's delusional. Please spend time in the rest of the work world, and you will see so. Expecting parity between, say, a line worker and an engineer is nonsense. And I truly mean no disrespect to the line worker. My father worked on the line at Ford for 30+ years, and I absolutely have total respect for him and his work. I would never say or think anything that impugns him or his memory.

Excellent. What union members need to realize is that there is palpable anger in the general public over this. It's at Tea Party levels, from what I can observe. Unfortunately, I think most of the union members with this mindset are far too wrapped up in their mentality to be able to objectively view the big picture. Frankly, when I read the usual us vs. them class warfare stuff as posted earlier in the thread, along with the claims of Ford's profits from last quarter (it takes only just a little understanding of finance to realize the flaw of that thought process), I get very discouraged. The rank and file has been failed by its local leadership, because they don't realize how tenous Ford's position is, and they seem to have no cognition of how Ford is competitively hamstrung by the BK's of GM and Chrysler, who got to write off debt and bad assets. It's just a big bowl of bad right now. The one hope is Mullaly, who has a very positive track record with unions going back to his Boeing days. I hope he can lead everyone to a solution.

Austin, isn't that the basic principle behind GM and BMW's "two mode hybrid" system used on the GM pickups?

Time to take the tin foil hat off:

I think there will be 2 tophats: the Euro Kugo sheetmetal will go to the Lincoln variant (with appropriate Lincoln grill and perhaps a bespoke interior), and the U.S. Escape will indeed retain its boxy heritage with its own sheetmetal. This would make the most sense to me for two reasons: we know Lincoln is supposed to get a vehicle off this chassis, and the Euro Kuga sheetmetal would make the most sense to differentiate it from the Escape (and give incremental economies of scale to the Kuga), and secondly, the Escape's volume allows a business case to be made to give it a separate tophat, which also allows the styling to retain its SUV heritage. A third reason (oops!) would be the dictate that all new Lincolns (going forward from the MKS and MKT) will no longer share sheetmetal with Ford. I think Ford intends to have(retain) parallel lines of CUV's and SUV's; if that is indeed the case, the Escape with SUV styling could be parallel to the Edge (with its CUV cues). The Lincoln 'Kuga' seems a foregone conclusion to give Ford a competitor against Audi's A5, etc..

I think he means that both use Integrated Motor Assist, which is very similar to GM's mild hybrid approach on the Malibu. Among other things, the Hondas cannot run in pure EV mode at all. Consequently, they are considered mild hybrids, not full hybrids like the Fusion and Escape.

I think when she told him she "hates the exterior of the Flex" he had his first clue.

The section I highlighted is a misunderstanding of how accounting works. The investment in retooling will be amortized over several years, and will not have a huge immediate impact on profits. The investment will affect cash flow, which is part of the reason that Mullaly went out and got the loans when he did.

GM is also owned by the U.S. government to the tune of $50 billion, and must some day buy out that ownership or remain a ward of the state. Why would that be preferable to Ford's ability to pay off its debts (presuming it can)?

Explain your reasoning please.

If the prediction of the analyst in the link is wrong, and Ford loses money in the third quarter, will you be willing to give back more?

From the linked article: Now this from Automotive News: So, extrapolating GM's 9 month sales from this article, they have sold around 1,167,000 units in the January-September time frame. My point is that Ford needs to pick up the pace and start closing more quickly on GM. I know they announced another plant for China in September, but I don't want to see them get too far behind GM and VW (the other leader in China) to be able to catch them.

Ford made a huge leap back to the future with the 2005; the 2010 is a nice update, but doesn't really move the ball forward. Both cars are hamstrung by the chassis to which they are wed. They are too big on the exterior for what they are, which is a 2+2 pony car. I'm not remotely suggesting that Ford turn them into rice burner wannabe drivers. Rather, imagine if the next Mustang were perhaps a 7/8 scale version of the current car's exterior size, while maintaining the current interior space. The overall reduction in mass would result in improved performance and fuel economy (less weight) while giving up nothing that Mustang owners demand, and losing what they don't need (excess size). Design wise, I'll reiterate what I posted earlier: move the ball forward, maintaining traditional Mustang cues, but evolve the car substantially. This is a young (and young at heart) person's car; it's time to quite making boomer retro machines. Again, that's Chevy's mistake with the Camaro, and Ford needs to move away from that design ethos.

Move the design of the car forward so that it is more relevant to today's young people. By contrast, I think GM made a HUGE mistake (long term) witht the Camaro - it will sell short term to boomers, but I don't see young people aspiring to that car at all. It's too big, too heavy, and looks back instead of forward in its design. In some ways, I think the Mustang is a victim of the chassis to which it's married. If Ford could somehow be able to create a more bespoke chassis for the Mustang, I think it would enable Ford to do much more with the car. When I think of how I would like to see Ford evolve the design of the Mustang, I think of how BMW has been able to evolve the design of the 3 series. Any enthusiast can look at a 3 series and know immediately what it is, but it is not slavish about being retro. In fact, as the car has evolved over the years, BMW has done an excellent job of incorporating new ideas in its design (shortening the front overhang, eliminating the forward leaning front end in favor of aero, adding trunk space, etc.) while maintaining its identity as a BMW 3 series. I'm not suggesting that Ford specifically do any of the things that BMW did to the 3 as it evolved, but I am suggesting that Ford needs to evolve the Mustang forward while still maintaining the key aspects that make it a Mustang. DON'T make it a 3 series - that's not what I'm saying.

I don't agree, if you look at the previous spy pics from April, Ford made no attempt whatsoever to cover up the C and D pillar area. In these newest pics, those areas and even the rear hatch glass are disguised. The area where the Taurus X's roof would kick up is also camouflaged, which is another new touch. Why go to all this trouble now, unless there is something new to disguise?

I don't think so, the hatchback has its tail lights up on the D pillars. And, it doesn't look like the sedan, which has much different tail light cutouts than this.

The Toyota looks more like a competitor for the Hyundai Genesis coupe - it just doesn't have the history imbued in the Mustang. Not to mention it won't be available with a V8.

What is shown in the second picture? It appears to be the rear sheet metal of something (there appear to be tail light cutouts on each side, and a license plate depression in the middle), but the tail light shapes do not match up at all with the Fiesta. Could this be another model for the plant?

It's exciting that Ford that the ability to invest capital in projects such as these (assuming the China announcement on Friday). Both markets represent future growth, and hopefully even more economies of scale over time for global products. Ford has a long way to go in China, but this upcoming announcement at least demonstrates Ford intends to get in the game in a much more definitive way in that marketplace .

No way. It might work with professional OTR truckers, but the average consumer, who can't even be trusted to change oil at regular intervals? No way.

Given Mazda's recent claims that, going forward, they will only share V6's with Ford (and not 4's), I'm curious to see what drivetrain will be in the M2. I hope that at some point Ford will offer an Ecoboost engine with the dual clutch tranny in the Fiesta, but I imagine it would have to be in a top of the line model, as those features would presumably push the Fiesta to a much higher price point.