bzcat
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Posts posted by bzcat
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2 hours ago, silvrsvt said:
The issue with the 1996 Taurus was someone got too happy with oval template and if I remember right the pricing was increased dramatically for it at the time.
The reskin in the early 2000s fixed that.
There was definitely something wrong with Ford's design template during that time. All 3 large sedans from that period looked like turds: Mk3 Taurus, Mk 2 Scorpio, AU Falcon
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5 hours ago, ice-capades said:
Ford has offered a Transit Wagon ever since the Transit series was introduced in the North American market for the 2015 Model Year.
Transit passenger vans in North America are also aimed at fleet customers. The last time Ford seriously tried to market a van for retail customer in North America was the 1992 E-150 Club Wagon. It was discontinued only after a year or two because no retail customers were that interested in a van.
The Tourneo version of the vans in Europe likewise is mainly targeting commercial buyers (airport shuttles, VIP shuttles, "minicab" taxi etc). The smaller Tourneo Connect and Tourneo Courier does have some non-commercial sales in Europe but that's mainly because the regular small vans/tall wagons like B-Max and C-Max have completely disappeared from the market, so what little of the demand left is pushed towards the Tourneo passenger vans.
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11 hours ago, rperez817 said:
Thank you GearheadGrrrl. Maybe fleet dumping of vans and other commercial vehicles was less prevalent in Europe than in the U.S. market, pre-pandemic? Nowadays, the Ford Pro business unit globally has moved away from dumping vehicles to the low bidder in any case. Rather than focusing mostly on sales quantity, Ford Pro is taking a firmer stance on vehicle pricing, particularly for BEV vans (E-Transit and Transit Custom Electric). Also, Ford Pro is selling high profit services and software along with vehicles to the giant companies and governments that comprise many of Ford's fleet customers in Europe and U.S.
Huh? When did Ford ever fleet dump vans? By definition, only fleets buy vans in any meaningful volumes so Ford's entire van business is geared towards maximizing margin on fleet sales. Selling van into retail private buyers is the margin killing part of the business, which is why Ford doesn't even try (they haven't offered Club Wagon version of Transit for a reason).
I guess retail dumping is a thing if Ford ever tries to sell unwanted vans to retail customers for cheap. But that never happens. Have you actually paid any attention to the transaction price on a van? You may want to do some research on that. This is a business that Ford has figured out and dominates on both sides of Atlantic and contributes significantly to the gross margin. It's such a cornerstone of Ford's profitability that Farley separated into its own profit center (Ford Pro) to highlight its contribution for the investor community. If the van business was all low margin like you imagined, Farley would have killed it like he did with Fiesta.
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16 hours ago, AM222 said:
That's what Stellantis did. They didn't kill the Opel Corsa and Peugeot 208. The new gen models were developed to have BEV versions alongside lower priced ICE models.
The Opel Corsa and Peugeot are in the top 5 in European sales.
Ford does not have a single model in the European top 15, its best-selling model is the Puma in 17th. A decade ago there were always several Fords in the top 10 and the Fiesta and Focus were always in the top 3.That's because the sales chart you are looking at ignore commercial vehicles. Ford Europe still has several top 15 vehicles. It's just they are called Transit and Transit Custom instead of Escort and Sierra. Ford is making better margin focusing on the right product than try to keep selling Fiesta. It was a strategic choice. It doesn't matter to Ford if the factory is building a Fiesta or a Transit... but one is profitable and the other one is not.
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It doesn't have anything to do with burying costs. Mach E is produced by Chang'an Ford so the cost is not moving, it was alway a Chang'an Ford cost. They are just getting rid of the separate distribution network setup to sell Mach E. Ford China wanted a separate direct to consumer sales process for Mach E where customers have to reserve the car from the website and bypass going to Chang'an Ford dealers. Ford setup a few separate showrooms in big cities but the only real way to buy the car is thru the internet.
Taking Mach E out of Chang'an Ford sales channel was probably a fever dream of some marketing expat from the US. Totally ignores how the Chinese market works. Another big mistake was calling it Mach E in China instead of coming up with a Mandarin name, probably another decision made by expat Ford China executive. The separate sales teams and showroom means regular Chang'an Ford dealers didn't have an opportunity to up-sell the car and the new Mach E sales team has no customer leads for a car that has no Mandarin name.
The majority of car sales in China is done through the sales people combing thru their contact list... in another word, by relationship. The idea that Ford can just setup a few dedicated showrooms and wait for customer to come find it on the internet shows a complete lack of knowledge on how cars are sold in China. It's really mind boggling for a company that has been in China for almost 2 decades. The fact that this got signed off probably also explains why Ford is now in the same category with Stellantis in China rather than in the same peer group as VW, Hyundai, or Toyota.
Jiangling Ford, the once forgotten backwater of Ford China that expat Ford executives don't want to have anything to do with, is starting to look like a much more successful operation than flagship Chang'an Ford, which is just sabotaged by constant stream of bad decisions on product, sales, marketing etc.
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Ford just keep sabotaging itself in China
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2 hours ago, joseodiaga4 said:
164 Aviators? ?? what’s happening?
Lack of inventory?
Looks like Ford has about 1,800 units in stock which based on YTD sales is roughly 45 days in stock. That normally is a good inventory level but when the gross number drops that low (below 2,000), availability becomes a problem. Maybe the customs wants blue but most of the 1,800 units are white, for example. That's an extreme example but you get the point... maybe the 1,800 scattered around dealer lots do not have desirable color or options and they are very slow to churn, while the dealers have ran out of the popular trim or option/color combo.
Looks at the production chart... in June, Ford stopped building Aviator/Explorer for part of the month. In July the production rebounded a little but still not to normal level. That means they are drawing down the inventory and if customer can't find the right combo at Lincoln dealer, they move on to the Acura or Audi dealer across the street.
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Is this the first month Bronco Sport outsold Escape?
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On 8/1/2023 at 10:03 AM, akirby said:
New EVs in Europe for Ford and Amarok truck for VW?Also Transit Connect which is a rebadged VW Caddy.
The partnership also include Ford supplying VW with a "one-ton" van which is still unknown but is probably the new Transit Custom rebadged as VW Transporter. Originally, VW was going to phase out production of T6 Transporter at Hannover to make room for ID Buzz (VW will keep making T7 Caravelle, Multivan and California) but it's unclear if that is still the case. Transit Custom was revealed earlier this year so if VW is going to follow thru, the Transporter should be out soon.
23 hours ago, 7Mary3 said:And Ford leaves Europe.
Ford is the largest van and pickup truck seller in Europe. It enjoys very good margin and pricing power on these products due to its market share so I don't see them leaving anytime soon. If they can pivot successfully to a CUV only or CUV-centric brand on the retails side it will probably be ok. Selling millions of Fiesta and Focus never made Ford any money in Europe. It was always propped up by margins from Transit vans, even back in the Escort and Sierra days. This is also why some not so bright people back in the day thought buying Volvo, Jaguar, and Land Rover was the solution to Ford Europe's problem because those cars held the possibility of higher margins.
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On 7/28/2023 at 3:19 PM, ausrutherford said:
More pictures of the new facelifted Transit and Transit EV in China with a large screen for a new interior. I hope the rest of the world gets it.
https://www.autohome.com.cn/news/202307/1286894.html#pvareaid=2028166
As I noted in the new product thread, this interior is carried over from the current Chinese market Transit Custom (which is sold as "Transit" but is changing its name to Tourneo to make way for this new Transit).
3 hours ago, rmc523 said:Is this based on our version? the body looks like an older version.
I know China tends to sometimes use older models and refresh them.
It's facelift version of the current MK4 Transit FWD.
The Mk3 Transit Pro is still for sale in China in RWD format.
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Ford is selling Bronco Sport as a premium product so the base model never made a whole lot of sense. Ford has Escape for people that want a cheaper vehicle. Or Maverick for that matter.
Base model on Bronco I get... there are some people who like to build their own offroader with aftermarket parts and starting from base model without the factory upgrades makes sense. Also Ford doesn't want you to defect to a base Wrangler instead. These are not concerns on Bronco Sport.
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39 minutes ago, rperez817 said:
"As long as possible" for Mustang V8 means "a few more years". The combination of upcoming regulatory standards and the superior performance of BEV will make Mustang V8 obsolete before the end of the decade.
The cost of compliance is going to rise and demand for it may shrink to a point it doesn't make financial sense to keep offering it. I'm not disputing that.
But you may be underestimating the longtail demand on ICE. Automatic transmission are cheaper for regulatory compliance and offer superior performance and yet about 5% of vehicles sold is still manual, despite many attempts to obsolete it. Same will be true of ICE by 2030.
If Mustang is the only ICE vehicle Ford sells in 2030, I think it can survive in limited volumes. They'll have to throw some money to hybridize it but in the US at least, CAFE is ostensibly technology agnostic and CARB has yet to adopt a total ban on ICE and may never do so.
And superior performance is not the selling point of ICE, specifically the V8 kind. There won't be anyone wanting a 2.0 I4 crossover with soul crushing CVT by 2035, I think that's clear... EV is a far superior solution. But we are not talking about that. Just like manual transmission, Mustang V8's appeal is emotional not rational or statistical.
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Sensible decision. But probably want to hedge a bit and still develop an EV Mustang.
Porsche is making the same decision on 911.
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On 7/28/2023 at 8:51 PM, jpd80 said:
Perhaps a move to standardise rear end components and reduce complexity of Chinese build and parts supply,
Thailand versions supplied to Australia still have leaf springs on lower series, our market is OK with that.
Chinese Ranger is pretty much going to be exclusively high end models. The entry level work horse type buyers will be offered JMC Dadao which appears to be cost-engineered version of new Ranger, or even older/cheaper designs like JMC Yuhu or Baodian.
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Some photos of Jiangling Ford Ranger... haven't seen them before.
The Wildtrak 1st edition model has a different grille from the US or RoW version.
https://www.autohome.com.cn/news/202307/1286648.html#pvareaid=3454480
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Ford China is launching a new Transit in China.
Looks like it is the Mk4 RoW model but revised with different front end and interior. Ford didn't introduce the Mk4 in China when it came out in 2014, and instead went with Transit Custom. It is now being introduced in China - Perhaps the new look will eventually make it to Europe and North America?
edit: The interior is from the current Chinese Transit Custom, which is currently sold as Transit (no Custom suffix) but Ford is also being renamed as Tourneo in China to focus on passenger van market so looks like Transit will be Transit again in China.
https://www.autohome.com.cn/news/202307/1286894.html#pvareaid=102624
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1 hour ago, Rick73 said:
Global warming is real. Wednesday Texas set an all-time electricity usage record due to unusual air conditioning loads. Thursday broke the record again, and it may fall again today. There is no doubt of global warming, and also that we are running out of time. However, that we have a “global” massive problem doesn’t mean that switching to BEVs will save us, even if we could do 100% transition overnight.As long as electricity is generated with fossil fuels, which is the case in the vast majority of the planet and will remain that way for a long time, a BEV will NOT decrease GHGs significantly more than fuel efficient hybrids like Prius and similar vehicles; if at all. We need to push efficiency in every aspect of life, and have to be smart because we have limited resources. I completely agree we are running out of time, but think we need to do more in areas other than BEVs, even if we delay transition.
I don’t expect you to belief me, but just look at global CO2 levels and see for yourself that we are not accomplishing much of anything towards saving humanity. Hybrid versus BEV won’t make a significant difference anyway — it is a drop in proverbial bucket.
You are assuming electricity will forever be generated with fossil fuel, which is just not the case. The power industry is also undergoing significant paradigm shift. The US for example, will be virtually free of coal power by around 2040 to 2045 timeframe. Our problem now is we can't use all of the cheap renewable power generated at peak because we don't have enough grid level storage capacity.
Vehicle tailpipe emission accounts for almost 20% of global CO2 emission. You can significantly reduce CO2 if you aggressively replace the fleet. The source of electricity will get cleaner and less carbon intensive year over year which is why rapid introduction of EV is crucial to combating global warming. Hybrids prolong fossil fuel dependence and doesn't benefit from electric grid that is shedding carbon.
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23 minutes ago, Deanh said:
based on the "save the earth mentality" being inaccurately promoted...Im not quite sure "efficiency" is a box people check.... and...Gasoline has about 100 times the energy density of a lithium-ion battery....and...fuel cells are approximately 2.5 times more efficient than gasoline engines....So...what bodes for BEVs future....going to be interesting...
You are just regurgitation bunch of misinformation.
Hydrogen is made from fossil fuel. And it is net-negative meaning it takes more energy to produce than it is available to consume. So the efficiency at the end point doesn't make up for the massively inefficiency upstream. Converting our transportation fleet to hydrogen will cause massive increase in CO2 emission.
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There is also the point that if we rely on hybrids, it prolongs the use of fossil fuel in transportation and the associated network effect on both upstream and downstream emissions in other sectors. We don't have the luxury of time for that to make a dent in global CO2 emission by doing a slow hybrid transition... the window on that expired back in early 2000s. Look at the extreme temperatures wide swath of North America and Europe is suffering from right now... If the rich industrial countries do not speed up transition to EV, it will have catastrophic consequences for lower income countries by mid century.
One other thing to remember when talking about hybrids... When Akio Toyoda was talking about hybrids, he was really talking about a mass unemployment problem for Japan. Farley for example has talked candidly about how much less labor hours are required to build EV vs. ICE and why Ford is shutting down plants in Europe. For Japan and Germany, the switch to EV really does mean looming massive layoffs that have societal implications. This is one reason Japanese Govt and car companies are so interested in hydrogen. It preserves the status quo on the industrial base and employment levels. Toyoda only brought up hybrids because he knows hydrogen is a technology dead end. But Toyota can ride the hybrid thing for another 15 years without making difficult decisions on massive layoffs and plant closings in Japan which will present a difficult political problem for the company.
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2 hours ago, Chrisgb said:
I am surprised at how far down Texas is. I would bet that North Dakota is in the top 3 for number of utility and cargo trailers. If you see a pickup that's not pulling something, it looks like something's missing.
Texas is a big state with lots of vehicle sales and highly urbanized population (despite popular perception, it is one of the top urban states in terms of population distribution). The top 10 states with highest truck % are all rural states without big cities and all have tiny populations and miniscule overall vehicle sales, and quite a few of them are mining/farming states where commercial truck fleets probably accounts for significant portion of vehicle registration.
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Very interesting that Ford has backed away from calling this Explorer. I guess they are trying to avoid market confusion since they are keeping the ICE Explorer in production indefinitely.
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They are taking the inventory in a point in time without any context. The churn rate is simply inventory on hand (point in time) divided by average sales volume (over time). Ford didn't produce any Mach E for 3 months and the sales volume fell as a result. And Ford started shipping them again at the end of June. So of course there is all of a sudden a glut of inventory in transit and arriving on dealer lots while average sales volume had been depressed due to previous inventory shortage. Things should even out in a couple of months.
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3 hours ago, Rick73 said:
Glad to see E-Series doing so well. Sales growth suggests planned upgrade is justified. Hope it is significant.
Not sure I understand second-quarter difference between Mach-E sales and manufacturing. What limited sales?
Ford shut down the plant for a few months to upgrade it (increase capacity). So delivery fell behind since most of Mach E sales is build to order.
Ford also announced Mach E will launch in several export markets later this year which coincides with production bump that is happening now that won't translate into higher sales in the US.
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1 hour ago, akirby said:
Not 600k sales for 2023. 600k run rate. Meaning 50k monthly sales.Also 600K run rate was worldwide not US. Puma and EU Explorer are launching later this year so it's possible we may get close. With MACH E now back to normal delivery and growing with additional capacity, it's reasonable to think they can hit 20~25k EV deliveries a month in the US soon. And if EU kicks in with 10-15k a month in Transit, Transit Custom, Transit Courier, MACH E, Puma, and Explorer, you are almost there.
I think if Ford misses this target it will be due to lack of progress being made in China.
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Changan Ford Takes Over Mustang Mach-E Operations in China
in Ford Motor Company Discussion Forum
Posted · Edited by bzcat
New Edge came later, mainly as a response to the disastrous oval period. Mk3 Taurus, Mk2 Scorpio, and AU Falcon were the last hurrah for Ford's "Aero" design language that was kicked off in 1982 with Sierra in Europe and 1983 Thunderbird in the US. It eventually lead to the oval period in the 90s (remember the oval grille opening and tail light on the Contour?). New Edge was a break from the oval period. New Edge featured more tapered lines and banished the ovals. Roughly speaking, if the car had any oval on it, it was not a New Edge car. The time period, based on when the design launched, roughly speaking is:
1982-1990: Classic Aero period
1991-1996: Late Aero period (aka Oval period)
1997-2005: New Edge
There are some overlap between the period of course due to designs being locked in ahead of production.
New Edge technically first appeared on 1997 Ka while the rest of the Ford was still stuck in the oval period. But it wasn't called New Edge until the 1999 Focus came out, and soon followed by Cougar and Mk3 Mondeo. Most New Edge cars have aged quite well: Mk3 Mondeo, Mk1 Focus, Mk1 Escape, Mk1 Puma, Mk4 Fiesta, Ka, Cougar, Mk1 Transit Connect, Mk1 C-Max etc.
The AU Falcon design is sometime credited as New Edge but design was locked in during the oval period but Ford Australia couldn't get funding to build it until the rest of the company has moved into the New Edge design language. A hastily organized redesign (AU II) incorporating New Edge elemented was launched even before AU was shown to the public. The AU was poorly received and the AU II update didn't help very much and the AU was quickly abandoned (planned AY and AZ facelift never happened). The next gen BA Falcon was firmly rooted in the New Edge design language. The difference was pretty obvious.
The New Edge Mustang (1999) is another compromised design and not a true reflection of New Edge. It was basically just a mild facelift of the 1994 SN95 Mustang from the Aero design language. The designers were not allowed to change any hard points of the body.