bzcat

The vast majority of public chargers are Level 2 so Corsair PHEV is perfectly fine to use them. There is very little need for PHEV to use DC charging (Level 3) because charging speed to directly related to the size of the battery pack. Adding DC charging to a PHEV is kind of a waste of money because they can't take advantage of the fast charging rate. The best analogy is people putting high performance brake on family sedans. Sure, you can do it but why? The car will never exceed the capability of the standard brakes so why add more cost and complexity of race car worthy brake pads and rotors on a car that doesn't need the stopping power?

When the plants were running a full tilt, they were pretty efficient. Even as recent as 5 years ago, Valencia was considered the most productive plant for Ford worldwide. Labor costs were always high in Germany and much lower in Spain and Romania but Ford is not unique amongst car producers in Europe. The big difference is US accounting rules regarding how companies have to account for pension costs. US GAAP requires US companies to report pension expense when the employee earns the benefit. Non-US companies using IFRS accounting rules do not have this problem as they can report pension expense when they are paid.

This is why I feel pretty sure Ford won't be building any passenger vehicles in Europe by the end of the decade. Cheaper to import from Thailand, India, and Mexico given the low volumes that Ford is selling now days in Europe.

This car seems much more on point with what the European market wants in an EV than the silly Capri.

I was going to mention this exactly. 70 series is by default the thing that is closest to American fullsize truck in terms of capability in Australia. It is also 40 years old and lacks many modern safety and comfort features. I wonder if Ford will also entertain similar setup Everest to go against the 70 series wagon.

Car sales in Europe is down overall. The economy there is not doing very well for a variety of reasons.

Let say 300 of that is Ford F-150. That's 3,600 a year. Add a few hundred each for NZ and South Africa so we are about 5,000. Increase that by 20% because it is cheaper with factory RHD built and now we are at 6,000 units a year... I can see why Ford doesn't want to bother. I always like to do the math on RHD fullsize trucks and SUV but it never gets any easier.

EV demand is not collapsing. Monthly EV sales are setting new record again every month. There was a brief dip in January and February this year and that's where this meme of EV collapsing came from. There were a couple of reason for this but it boils down to people pulling ahead of planned purchases in 2023 due to uncertainty of tax benefits in 2024 in US and China. But most of that was temporary. EV sales has resumed on the same pace as before and the brief dip in early 2024 will barely register in the long run. Don't fall for the trap of basing your view on limited (and aged) data. If you zoom out, EV sales are rising in an incontrovertible direction. Sure... a bit slower than some predicted but the big picture didn't change. Don't be fooled by monthly variations... that's just noise in the data.

How many Ram or F-150 are sold in Australia a year? I'm really curious if factory RHD can really work.

Very interesting... so Ranger has higher GVM in Aus. Almost in the middle of the range of F-150 GVWR in the US.

The possible wind down of Ford Europe manufacturing is the main reason. Ford is protected from that eventuality now that Transit Connect is made by VW and Transit Courier, Custom, and the big Transit are made by Ford Otosan. No supply disruptions to the part of business that actually makes money. Another way to think about this is to ignore the geographic distinction because there really isn't one. Both Ford Europe and Ford Otosan operate in the same markets (EU plus UK, Norway, Switzeralnd, and Turkey). The difference is one is responsible for passenger vehicles and the other one is responsible for commercial vehicles. VW, Daimler and Stellantis also operate the same way: Company / Passenger Vehicle Unit / Commercial Van Unit Ford / Ford Europe / Ford Otosan VAG / Various car brands / VWCV Mercedes AG / Mercedes / Mercedes Vans Stellantis / Various car brands / Sevel

4500 kg GVM which I assume is similar to how US GVWR is calculated means Ranger HD is a Class 2B truck here (F-250/Ram 2500). In the US, Ranger GVWR max out at 6,170 lbs. (2,800 kg) to avoid stepping on F-150's toes. There is a big gap between 2,800 kg and 4,500 kg... is there an AUS Ranger that is currently above 2,800 kg GVM?

If I'm right, then it's kind of a sad end to nearly 100 years old history of Ford building passenger cars in Europe. The more I think about this, the more I'm convinced Farley made up his mind 2 years ago. If Ford was to pivot to a commercial van only production situation in Europe, what is the odd one that sticks out? It is Transit Connect which is build in Spain by Ford Europe. The rest of the Transit family products are made by Ford Otosan. When the VW deal happened, I was really scratching my head on why Ford would give up on a key product like Transit Connect. I thought maybe the preference for US-centric model caused Ford Europe to walk away. But in retrospect, it seems to be a production utilization decision. Ford can now close Valencia without big impact to its van strategy. Putting Ford Otosan in charge of Romania was a clarifying event. Both of these actions were clearly related. Craiova - B2 Puma/Transit Courier plant (transferred to Ford Otosan) Saarlouis - C2 Focus plant (slated for closing) Cologne - MEB plant (probably not long for this world) Valencia - C2 Kuga plant (??? not looking good with India coming online and no firm plans to replace ICE Kuga, Transit Connect axed)

Ford really isn't that interested in boosting Ranger volume it seems. They rather just cut back on Bronco.

The writing has been on the wall in China for a while now. With vehicles all becoming software defined, there is just no way car companies can continue to sell the same vehicles in China as they do the rest of the world. In order to deploy software in China, foreign companies have to have the system and data hosted in China and you have to provide the source code to the Ministry of Stealing Industry and Technology. This is why Ford gave up a few years ago and switched to using Baidu's operating system in China. And why VW is going to use Xpeng's software. And also why Google and Amazon Cloud are not in China.