banker55

How things go wrong with modern technology and people...Delta A320 lands at Ellsworth Air Force Base instead of Rapid City Airport. Modern Airliner, satellite navigation, air traffic control, modern radar, airport navigation systems, visual?????

I used to take a unit home every day to the tune of 30 miles round trip.The next day at 11:am you had to report out on that unit. The unit was supposed to be perfect as it had been final QC'd. If you found a problem it was fixed and the problem was fed back to production and QC. Most times a problem generated a 50 car check looking for a trend and may be required for 10 days. If you found the same problem in the audit more special procedures . If it was a delta operation, shipping was shut down.A sticker was placed on the window explaining the miles. A good unit to get. No one else was allowed to drive the unit.

The numbers for unit sales and revenue are simple arithmetic as is the average, A richer mix should show up in revenue, but I do not see it. I agree with you that Ford has improved in a lot of areas.Sales are up and so is market share At the end of quarter one last year,after reporting a $443 million dollar loss,Shanks said the results in Europe would be greater than the $250 million he had projected,but less than the billion dollars reported in 2014.Ford lost $18 million in the second quarter and $182 million for a total of $643 loss. These are financial accounting numbers. They are not simple arithmetic. A change in accounting took Ford Europe from a certain significant loss for 2015 to a profit.By changing to marked to market pension accounting Ford of Europe swung to a $259 million dollar profit. I understand why Ford changed the pension accounting and going forward it will affect the numbers,both good and bad,as things like discount rates and investment markets change.Please don't take these numbers as a personal attack. They are Ford Motor Company numbers. My only point was that I expected to see a revenue improvement from the higher margin vehicles.Just arithmetic, not accounting.

Comparing first quarters 2015 and 2016 for Europe 376000 unit sales 2015 $6.9 billion revenue 399000 unit sales 2016 $6.9 billion revenue Factor in Fords 6% exchange rate differential and it looks pretty flat. $18351 vs $17293 revenue per unit in US dollars 2015 vs 2016...even if you adjust at 6%. I was expecting a significant uptick in revenue per unit. The sales and revenue numbers are from Ford's first quarter report.

Just got off a Delta 757 with touch screens in the seat backs. Talk about closing speeds!

Worked for me...thanks

GM production figures indicate a problem of some kind. Dec 2014 vs Dec 2015 Chev Col 5942 to 5508 GMC 2205 to 2270 Jan 2015 vs Jan 2016 Chev 5904 to 3959 GMC 2561 to 1325 Those are poor numbers at 18 months for a truck that is sold out.....pathetic is a more apt description. Compare Toyota production up 17000 to 18000 F series January 84917 production excluding chassis build. Express and Savanah sales are down big for January???? . numbers from Auto News. Maybe mid-size trucks is a good market to stay away from?

Dealer said I can get you the floor mats, but you may have to wait for a 2017 truck.....does either floor mat work for you?

At $92,000 plus they want $250 for all season floor mats.

Eco MooMoo has a nice ring

These plants in a changeover constrained year built 626,120 new model trucks plus 22,449 of the old model. A lot of production was lost at KCAP for change over and ramp up. They also lost production due to frame shortages. I am sure they can build over 700,000 if they have the parts. The HD plant built 313,835, which are part of F-series numbers. (numbers are from Automotive News) The three plants together can build over 80,000 per month. They beat that for 2015. Kentucky Truck is changing to add capacity and Ohio Assembly is picking up some HD production.

I may have missed it. Was the Hertz spin-off in 2005 included in your calculations. I am sure I received some Hertz shares or cash or more Ford shares.

I started accumulating F in 1977 as part of my pay package.For every $10 dollars invested, Ford gave you $6.00 in shares . I still own a bunch. I also received Citi, Hertz and Visteon from the spinoffs. I sold them. I am looking at snow out my home office window,so no island for me either. Being retired,I can and do spend a lot of time with investments.....I just looked at the snow again.

I commend you on your short to medium term investment acumen , but lets look at a longer view. If you had bought 3000 Ford shares at the turn of the last century it would have cost around $100000. Today those shares would be worth $33333. Your dividend income would be $1800. Between the middle of 2006 and the start of 2012 Ford stock paid zero dividends. The same investment in GM or Chrysler would have netted you a zero balance.

CAP is running 3 shifts with tag relief and has increased line speed in the past year. I do not know the shift configuration.

Chicago numbers to end of September. 2015 2014 Explorer 213501 214851 Taurus 57515 59285 MKS 5880 5835 I would say they are close to capacity at 360000 to 370000 per year . Ford makes some Explorers in Venezuela and Russia, but not a very large number.

Chicago is 2.8 million square feet .Oakville is 5.5 million square feet. Sounds like poor management , not a shortage of space.

If I remember right, it was a 600 million dollar expenditure to basically change the nameplate.

Happy New Year. Paint and Final Assembly(Chassis and Trim) are in line sequence ...all units back to back to back. Body looks to be the same to me. Lots of money spent upgrading to laser welding robotics and dimension controls. Paint has the newest electronic checks for paint quality. Line speed looks slower to me. Maybe low 60's. This place used to be a very fast plant...like the Kentucky Plants...I have not worked there since 1999....Windstar.....further back I worked at Oakville Truck. I think they are running 2 shifts plus a half....to maximize production.....no size constraints as there is lots of square feet.

Unites States - Michigan Assembly Plant Type: Assembly Employees: 4,468 Year Opened: 1957 Legal Entity: FNA Plant Size: 5,000,000 sq ft Site Size: 369 acres The above numbers are from Ford Corporate. As Richard said, STAP built Panthers and Escorts together in the early 80's. They built 2 door, 4 door and wagon Ford and Mercury Panthers plus 2 door Escorts at over 60 per hour. The wagons included the Country Squire and the Colony Park. The plant was not a flex plant. The plant did not have ILVS. The plant made its own seats,sub assembled instrument panels, door trim panels, headliners and rear door glass assemblies. Door glass was tinted or clear, full, sail mirror and vent window. Right side mirror was an option .Built and installed vinyl roofs. 6 interior colors. Escort had different interior and exterior colors . The plant had in line water test before seat, carpet and trim installations with QC and repair followed by a second in line water test for QC buy off. (it was eliminated years later to increase assembly room and make job re-distributions easier and more flexible.) Oakville would have identified their Edge problem on the first unit with this old system. STAP ran with around 3000 people and the plant was under 3 million square feet. The plant also built 2 tone colors retail and 50,000 to 70,000 police/fire/taxi/FBI/Air Force/Army units. Lots of paint stripes and different exterior body side mouldings.

Arlington's production was up 32 percent from the prior year to 162,431vehicles at the halfway point of 2015. Spending $1.4 billion may get them more production, but I don't see a big uptick in sales above the present numbers.Arlington is a big profit plant for now.GM is spending at it's truck plants as well looking to increase production by 60,000 units.

Moving product is very expensive for equipment and installation. Manpower training is required in one or more plants.Each work station has to be redone from an industrial engineering point of view and from a process engineering point of view. You have to review ergonomics and safety. Review material handling flow. You lose production during ramp up. A Lincoln specific plant would build 100000 units(guess) in a 300000 unit plant. The move costs a lot of cash before job 1 and effectively triples your fixed costs per unit. Looks to me like 200000 units of capacity are off the table. You would be creating a slow, inefficient one shift plant that could not handle an economic downturn.

The truck plant, which opened in 1969 and has been running close to its rated annual capacity of 365,000, will hike that by 55,000 to 420,000, Ford said. The plant will add 350 jobs to its current workforce of nearly 4,000.( Reuters January 2014.) In 2013 KTP built 272,521 HD trucks and 78,500 SUV's. If Ford needs more F150's, they should be able to get them from the two F150 plants, on three shifts. Low 300,000 's are obtainable running 2 shifts on overtime with no weekends. Two 10's Monday to Thursday plus two 8's on Friday, at 68 per hour is 326400 not adjusting for holidays but including two weeks vacation. I am using 68 because Pioneer in the past said 1 truck every 52 seconds and I worked two plants that ran 68/hour. KTP is in the high 70's.

LaNeve said Ford started June with 75,000 F-150s in inventory, down from 141,000 a year ago and still well below its target level of 120,000 to 130,000. “We’re at full production right now, but not full availability yet,” LaNeve said on a conference call with analysts and reporters. “It gets better every month from here, not just in terms of absolute inventory but the right cab mix.”....from today's Automotive News

FCA Capital Spending 2011 5.528 billion euros Operating cash flow 5.195 billion euros 2012 7.416 billion 6.444 2013 7.440 7.589 2014 8.121 8.169 Ford 2011 $4.293 billion $9.784 billion 2012 $5488 $9.045 2013 $6.597 $10.444 2014 $7.463 $14.507 The company that is three times bigger by market cap is being outspent by a considerable margin. Free Cash Flow is operating cash flow minus capital expenditures, Ford has $7.0 billion, FCA basically nothing left. FCA even outspent GM the last couple of years.