rperez817

Automotive News reported a couple months ago that Nissan intends to retire the ICE powered Versa and Altima in the U.S. in a couple years. The car may return as a BEV after 2025, as Nissan is planning to introduce 19 new BEV models by 2030. Nissan Altima’s run ends as focus turns to electric vehicles (electrek.co)

First Cybertruck was sold at a Petersen Automotive Museum Auction a couple days ago. https://www.caranddriver.com/news/a45485974/2024-tesla-cybertruck-auction/

Huh?

Mainly the 1" to 1.5" suspension lift that bzcat mentioned. More often than not, this aspect of crossover type vehicles degrades driving dynamics compared to a sedan or wagon with a lowered suspension, but fails to provide true off-road capability comparable to a traditional 4x4 SUV or pickup truck.

As owners of a Mustang Mach-E, my wife and I are used to it. From a marketing promotion standpoint, the crossover craze nowadays represents one of the most brilliant achievements of the global automotive industry, getting consumers to willingly pay more for compromised products by cultivating an "active lifestyle" image.

The former is not necessarily better than the latter.

Both of them.

You are correct Rick73 that Tesla is doing well in terms of the holy grail in automotive marketing, high loyalty + high conquest rate. Perhaps more interesting is that loyalty of BEV owners to electric propulsion increased significantly since 2015, even with Tesla taken out. Here is the data for 2015-2020. Another interesting piece of data is that Tesla's loyalty in the U.S. is driven by customers from racial and ethnic minority groups. This is unusual for a U.S. domestic automaker.

Data from Cox Automotive at the end of August 2023.

That's correct. A lot of Tesla's conquest customers also come from the Tier 1 luxury brands of Mercedes-Benz, BMW, and Audi too. And once those customers buy a Tesla, they are loyal to Tesla. The company has both the highest owner loyalty and the highest conquest rate in the industry.

Hyundai/Kia joined the NACS club yesterday for its U.S. market BEV. Hyundai, Kia to adopt Tesla EV-charging standard from 2024 in US | Reuters

In terms of positioning in the "luxury" aspect of premium automotive brands, Tesla is below Mercedes-Benz, BMW, and Audi but above Acura, Infiniti, and Lincoln.

That's correct T-dubz. UAW was poised for a possible strike at GM's Arlington, Texas plant as a bargaining tactic for ensuring GM's Ultium battery plants are covered by the national UAW labor agreement. It worked. GM Ultium Plants To Be Included In National UAW Agreement (gmauthority.com) Hopefully Ford agrees to a similar arrangement with UAW.

Thanks for sharing zipnzap. It's not surprising that only 2 Fords are on the list, nor is it surprising that Tesla is the only premium/luxury brand represented among the top 25. The ongoing revolution in the automotive industry combined with residual impacts of supply chain issues is causing a shakeup.

That someone won't be Ford Blue division. As mentioned earlier, costs associated with designing, engineering, manufacturing, and marketing "a better sedan, something appealing" at Ford are excessive would not meet the company's hurdle rate criteria.

A Ford BEV sedan for the U.S., Canada, and Mexico markets would be a nice addition to the product lineup IMO, but unlikely. Also, "Fusion" along with other Ford passenger car nameplates that aren't "Mustang" are tainted and best kept as historical items.

Those battery plants are a pillar of Ford Motor Company's entire existence in the near future, and UAW has a legitimate concern about the extent to which they will be staffed by UAW represented employees. Hopefully as you mentioned UAW leadership will present something meaningful in this context to the membership.

I agree, but Consumer Reports wanted to be comprehensive in getting a representative sample of consumers who had a valid driver's license at the time of the survey. Even a though a high proportion of the Silent Generation may be getting a bit old to drive, the majority of them are interested in getting a BEV at some point if they do end up buying a new car according to that survey!

In the U.S., the majority of car buying consumers are on the same page. Another survey from Consumer Reports conducted 3 years ago found that 71% of respondents were at least somewhat interested getting BEV for a future car purchase. That was before the tipping point for BEV mass adoption occurred in the U.S. If a similar survey was conducted nowadays, an even higher proportion of consumers would respond affirmatively to considering BEV for a future car purchase or lease.

All of them except Honda Accord and Chevy Malibu.

ice-capades kindly posted the 2024 F-150 Lightning order guide to the "Dealer Order Guides" section of the site. The guide confirms that Extended Range XLT is no longer available for 2024 MY. Standard Range Lariat has been dropped as well. The hierarchy for 2024 is as follows. Pro Standard Range Pro Standard Range with LFP Battery (late availability) XLT Standard Range XLT Standard Range with LFP Battery (late availability) Flash Extended Range Lariat Extended Range Platinum Extended Range Platinum Black Package Extended Range 2024 F-150 Lightning Order Guide.pdf

The Ford+ plan for its Blue division should finally address Ford's woeful situation with out-of-control costs, complexity, and inefficiency in product development and engineering in that division. The removal of sedans from its North American and European product lineups will make it easier for Ford to implement this plan.

Only Ford executives know for sure, but automotive industry analysts indicated for years that Fusion was a low or no profit product in the U.S. market.

The specific example of reduced costs for new car customers in the Consumer Reports study was "$7,000 in per-vehicle lifetime fuel savings for model year 2021 vehicles compared with model year 2003", a direct result of CAFE and other fuel-economy mandates during that timeframe. But the cost reductions go far beyond that when all stakeholders are considered (e.g., reduction in deaths and injuries, reduced costs of certain automotive technologies due to economies of scale, etc.). Going back to the CAFE proposals for 2027-2031 MY vehicles referenced in the OP, NHTSA mentioned that automakers "are free to use electric vehicles to comply and avoid penalties altogether". Since 100% electric vehicles represents one component of the global automotive industry's future, this is an example in which government and industry should be on the same page.

All good points zipnzap. Ultimately, it comes down to the substantial costs to Ford associated with redesigning Fusion so that it's competitive in its segment. Ford wisely decided that those costs weren't worth it, and pursued alternatives. Ford could hypothetically import the current Changan Ford Mondeo from China and relabel it as Fusion for the U.S., Canada, and Mexico markets, but it's unlikely that product would have much appeal.