bzcat

https://insideevs.com/news/369896/ford-three-new-plug-in-hybrids-debut/ Ford's appears to be fully committed to staying in Europe with a full range of electrified vehicles. 8 launching in 2019 and 17 by 2024. Ford also confirmed for the firs time that both known Model E variants are slated for Europe - the Mustang inspired MACH E and the unnamed utility that Ford is planning to build at Flat Rock.

That's another US-market induced blunder. Hybrid is stuck with the 6 speed auto instead of the new 8 speed because Ford gave up on putting any serious money into Fusion.

There is no 5 door Mondeo hatchback hybrid. They are either sedans or wagons. See page 44: https://www.ford.co.uk/content/dam/guxeu/uk/documents/feature-pdfs/FT-Mondeo.pdf Hatchback is available only with gasoline or diesel engine options. Mondeo hatchback sales is concentrated in the UK where non-luxury badge large sedan sales are basically non-existent. So I think the hybrid sedan is selling abysmally in Europe (and UK in particular) so it is probably headed to the scrape heap. Hybrid wagon still makes sense in mainland Europe where Mondeo are mainly sold as wagon.

Mondeo sedan and hatch are still around in Europe but looks like Ford will discontinue the sedan hybrid (hence making it wagon only?) For now, it looks like you can get Mondeo hybrid in both sedan and wagon in Europe.

I think the sales number indicates Ford didn't have to give away the TC for pocket lint like it did with Ranger. If you eliminated all the fleets that bought Ranger because it was the cheapest thing Ford sold, then you are probably left with a sales volume that is not all that different from TC sales. so from Ford's perspective, TC was probably a very successful fleet product. Napa Auto Parts for example, replaced their Ranger with Fiesta, Sonic, and other assorted B-segment hatchbacks... they didn't go with TC. But that just shows that they didn't really need a Ranger for parts runner. They had a bunch of Ranger because it was really cheap. They replaced them with the next cheapest Ford. BTW, found this hilarious photo

I'm pretty sure Ford is very pleased with all the fleet buyers that it has retained with Transit Connect. The old Ranger was a hard sell towards the end and Ford had to basically give it away. Ford is definitely not giving away the TC now. TC also has picked up new fleet buyers that were not interested in pickup trucks. So it's a net win for Ford as far as fleet market is concerned.

They should have just used the Chinese market front end. Looks so much more upscale and grown up design than the cartoon like US market one.

BTW, I just noticed Ford took Yusheng S330 off the Yusheng website in China... so I guess Territory is replacing S350 for good. So maybe S350 is not long for this world either. The Maverick name is available... 😄 This website used to have both S330 and S350: http://suv.jmc.com.cn/ Now there is no S330 but only link to Territory on the JMC website: http://territory.jmc.com.cn/

Ka/Figo/Aspire is going to use a value-engineered Fiesta platform so I don't think there is any significant drama there. It's now South America only project I believe as Europe has dropped out preferring to focus on Fiesta only for the car side and EcoSport and Puma on the CUV side. Open question on whether Ford China will join the program. India will go with Mahindra based replacement. The crossover is a bit of mystery. I think the current South America designed EcoSport is likely to be split into at least 2 different models - one in India which will be replaced by a Manhindra based CUV, and one in South America/Europe, probably based on the value-engineered B architecture that will also underpin the Ka/Figo. The reason for the split is obvious... market demands for India (4 meters length and no demand for safety equipment) is vastly different than elsewhere. Don't forget also that Zyote Ford is also coming out with a whole bunch of cheap cars/CUVs based on Zyote platform, similar to the arrangement with Manhindra. Some of these may even find its way overseas. Yusheng S330/Territory is *probably* based on the CD2 Escape. There is no definitive proof but there was report around 2014 that Ford shipped the CD2 Escape tooling from Ford Taiwan to China after production ended in Taiwan. Most people expected that means we will see cheap rebadged Escape under the JMC brand but it never happened. Instead, we had Yusheng S330 that came out about 18 months after Ford Taiwan switched to making Kuga. Jiangling is also using this platform to make its one CUV for its Landwind brand (the infamous Range Rover Evoque rip off) so it probably had some involvement in the development. Future version of this car will likely use C2 platform. JMC Yuhu pickup truck and Yusheng S350 SUV are *probably* based on the previous gen Ranger (the one before T6). Again, there is no proof but Yuhu and Yusheng S350 (which is BOF SUV based on Yuhu platform) are similar in size to the previous gen Ranger and Everest. The big clue is timing... previous gen Ranger/Everest ended production in Thailand in 2011 - Yuhu and Yusheng S350 came out in 2012. And if you want to read into the fact that Yuhu, S350, and T6 Everest are all build on the same assembly line by Jingling Ford, you can probably guess they have a fairly high degree of commonality. Future version of these two vehicles will likely use T6 platform. JMC Teshun is rebadged Mk3 Transit which Jiangling Ford finally stopped selling in 2017. I think as long as the drivetrain meet emission standards in China, it will be in production. In theory, Ford can cascade down Mk4 Transit (still sold as "New" Transit in China) to Teshun but that will leave Ford brand without a large van in China. The Mk5 FWD Transit and Toureno Custom are available in China but it is obviously smaller than the RWD Mk4.

Future Products past CY 2021 "Affordable" Ford Product Fusion white space replacement vehicle (Might be the same as affordable Ford product?) New Mustang on CD6 Baby Bronco Pickup Transit Connect refresh - This is all new Mid sized CUV BEV for Lincoln and Ford - 2022 Rivian based SUV/Pickup - Lincoln Small BEV based on VW platform (EU) Next Super Duty - 2022 + Unibody C2 pickup truck And no specific dates for these but figures it will be around 2022/23 New Everest - CN, AP New Transit Custom (and VW Transporter clone) - EU, SA, CN, AP New Yusheng S350 and JMC Yuhu (possibly based on the outgoing T6 Everest/Ranger platform) - CN, AP And probably after 2023 New Yusheng S330 / Territory - CN, SA

That's not related to the point we are discussing which is MACH E is using a Ford developed EV platform and not a C2 vehicle. Ford is going to use MEB in Europe mainly because VW is willing to foot the bill. And we don't know yet what Ford is planning to do with the Rivian platform.

A marketing move for Mustang... Most F-150 buyers were fine with 4.6... if anything, the nostalgia is for the 351 more than 5.0

There was no presumption in my post. No one has ever reported that Ford has two EV platform under development. You are the only one saying that. C2 was a standardized platform matrix for vehicles with an ICE on top of front axle. There are certain fixed hard points like the placement of firewall in relation to the front axle for engineering reasons. For example, if the distance is the same, you can use the same steering rack and subframe module for all the vehicles. You can of course make an EV out of C2 but you are still married to those hard points laid out - which is not a very efficient way to make an EV. You certainly don't need all that room in front of the windshield for ICE. If you are changing all the hard point on C2 for EV, it is no longer a C2. That was my point. The MACH E prototype (and the mules before that) clearly showed very different proportions and hard points compare to C2. Also I didn't say Model E platform is a clean sheet design. Ford did. EV platform was outlined as one of the 5 platforms that Ford will deploy going forward: 1. C2 for transverse mounted ICE 2. CD6 for longitude mounted ICE 3. Unibody platform for vans 4. BOF platform for trucks 5. Platform for EV Here is Hau Thai-Tang talking about the EV platform https://www.automobilemag.com/news/ford-platforms-hau-thai-tang-interview/ Again https://autoweek.com/article/car-news/ford-will-build-all-vehicles-five-platforms And agin https://www.cnet.com/roadshow/news/ford-platform-sharing-plan/

The whole point of C2 was that it has fixed mounting point for firewall to save cost - all the transverse ICE car are using it so Ford can use one set of components to save money both during engineering/design phase and manufacturing. BEV without the engine in front means moving the firewall and a lot of hard mounting points like steering rack and transmission etc. Location of battery also changes calculation for a lot of crash safety protection envelope. So no, you will not save any significant sum of money by starting with C2. Ford had said before the BEV is a cleansheet design to take advantage of the fact that it is not an ICE car. The lesson they learned from Focus EV was to not do an EV based on ICE platform. GM lost the economy of scale because it failed to capitalized on the Bolt platform to quickly add model and scale up. Ford is planning to introduce a whole bunch of models based on this platform so we shall see.

The short front section (the section formerly known as "hood") is playing tricks on my eyes making the car look short. The long wheelbase is also hiding the true size... I know someone keep saying this is a C2 vehicle but it is clearly not the case. Look at the gap between the front wheel arch and the front door cut line... this is clearly not FWD C2 platform. No C2 vehicle has this kind of proportion. If you want prove, dig up the old thread on this car when the first mule showed up. We had a discussion on it and the wheelbase and the forward placement of the front axle are pretty obvious sign that this is a new platform. Edit:

Couple of points: First, 18 miles EV range is an estimate like the original horsepower and torque numbers. We know how that turned out. Second, the estimate is for EPA range. There is no requirement in the US for PHEV to meet any EV-only range to get emission offset credit so there is no incentive for Ford to tune the software to extend EV only range at the expense of overall energy efficiency or battery longivity. In another jurisdiction, testing methods can (and will) yield different EV-only range without any changes. WLTP EV range is typically 10 to 15% better than EPA so 18 mile EPA could mean 20 miles in WLTP before Ford tweak the software.Ford can easily change the software to extend EV range. In fact, the choice of lower power motor than some competitor like Porsche is probably a design decision to deliver 50km EV only range in China. Third, to further expand on #2, performance and range are the two sides of the same coin in an EV. Ford can dial up one and dial down the other, and vice versa. It's a decision to can be changed from market to market, and for different applications. Fourth, the beauty of PHEV and EV is battery's physical size is not the sole limiting factor in range (storage size). Ford may have engineered in future power increases once more energy dense cells are available to meet Ford's price point. Tesla Model S hasn't been resigned since it went on sale but battery storage size (measured in kilowatt hours) have increased roughly 30% since it came out. Tesla has mostly given the extra kw/h to extract better performance but as noted in #3, they could have also kept the performance identical and just extended the range. The fact that they went for performance tells you something about the vast majority of people buying expensive EVs.

Exactly what I was thinking... Bronco is basically the original concept for Explorer (Ranger based SUV), so Bronco Sport is a great name for the 2 door, and Bronco Sport Trac a nature name for the Bronco pickup truck that's been rumored about. Baby Bronco will have approximately 0% chance of sucking... Ford doesn't really miss on trucks and SUVs. I like Bronco Scout or Scout... both are pretty good name. The unibody truck can be called Bronco Courier or just Courier. Bronco Adventurer is a mouthful and will result in people calling it the "Small Bronco" or "Baby Bronco" which is the worst case for Ford in terms of branding and model differentiating. We are calling it Baby Bronco as almost a term of endearment. That won't be the case when regular people starting calling it that way. "Baby" anything is almost a negative when it comes to consumer products.

These are the additional variants of Model E platform. It's unclear right now what Ford plans to do with Rivian's platform.

Haven't thought about the 4WD angle but that's a good point. F600 will also continue to benefit from investment in Superduty which 650 lacks. So #1 and #3 are all upsides for Ford with little downside. #2 is a bit ambiguous but certainly plausible for 600 and 650 to coexist as you mentioned.

The question here is who buys F600 - is it... 1. Buyers that would otherwise opt for F550 2. Buyers that would otherwise opt for F650 3. Buyers that would otherwise opt for a competing product If it is #1, then the higher cost to Ford probably pays for itself. If it is #2, then I think this will ultimately cripple the medium duty business for Ford. If it is #3, it is all gravy. My guess if Ford's market research tells them they have an opportunity to up-sell F550 buyers and also make Chevy's MD launch more difficult - so a combination of #1 and #3. I don't think they would peruse this strategy if they believe their own MD business will be in jeopardy.

I believe this is the first time we've seen product codes assigned to the bigger EVs.

The unibody pickup truck started as a Transit Connect truck but I believe it has morphed to something more like Baby Bronco truck. Not much difference in engineering since they are all C2 but the styling probably will look more SUV than van and that makes a lot of sense. The name is a bit difficult to tease out. I think Bronco Sport may actually be the 2 door Bronco rather than Baby Bronco. And that will make your Sport Trac theory a lot more solid too.

My prediction is Model E or MACH E will be sized close to Edge and starting MSRP around $50k. Ford is planning to use VW's MEB for smaller EV so the Escape sized on priced under $40k will come later.

Because the rest of the Expedition line up are using truck trim levels: XLT ==> Lariat ==> King Ranch ==> Platinum ==> Limited The "Limited" on Expedition is out of sequence. It is supposed to the Lariat.

The question is why Limited is there instead of Lariat.