Gurgeh

Prius as virtue-signaling has become passe. Tesla is the new "aren't I grand!?" car.

You had me at Prius.

I think with those brands many are buying the status as much as the vehicles themselves. Status buyers are, I think, particularly vulnerable to the allure of the logo that Tesla offers.

It is the emblem that makes people think luxury, not the actual vehicle. Tesla has done a great job of branding so when people see a car ahead of them with that logo attached they think luxury, whether that particular vehicle really qualifies or not. Granted, the top line Teslas are legitimate luxury vehicles. But Model 3 and Y? Not really. Their interiors contain few luxury materials and are austere and cold, unlike Lincoln which in recent years (despite its other problems) has arguably been designing some of the most luxurious interiors on the market. And to me the 3/Y exteriors are boring and frankly kind of ugly (though exterior style is of course personal and subjective). You do make a good point about technology, but that is mainly due to Tesla being an EV and that much of its EV technology remains ahead of other automakers who have more recently entered the market.

Do a build and price on the Navigator. It is pretty much impossible to build one below $100,000, unless you go with a base model with no-to-few options. The Reserve and Reserve L start just under (and any options at all plus tax will push you over), and the two Black Label versions both start above that level. One of them well above.

Interesting conversation. Something to remember in the discussion over whether FMC can make money on low-margin sedans either added into the production mix at Flat Rock or imported from Ford plants in China. Going forward, the company is going to have to be even more careful about product profitability. Lower profit sedans would be even harder to make financially viable using UAW labor under the new contract. If Ford had extra production capacity in Mexico that might be a more feasible option for North American production. And remember, importing from China still faces a head wind of 25% import duties. I'm not sure how much Ford expects to make from the 2024 Nautilus imports. My guess is that bringing over the Nautilus from China is more about preserving Lincoln -- which, without it, would have dropped to only 3 products -- than about improving overall corporate profits.

It's like that in the federal workforce as well. Non-performers, and there are a lot of them, can theoretically get fired, but the process takes too long and is insanely complicated. So the poor workers tend to get shunted into jobs that don't do much or "promoted" into new jobs where they become someone else's problem. Hard working government workers, and there are a good number of them, then just find more and more work piled on their shoulders until they collapse. As a federal manager (in the Treasury Department) I actually initiated the firing process on a University of Virginia PhD economist who spent his entire day playing solitaire on the computer. After about a year of working laboriously through the firing process we finally convinced him to just retire. It might have taken a second year to bring the process to its conclusion.

It is ironic that the folks who are trying to push us out of single family homes into high-density living are the same folks trying to push us out of ICE-based vehicles into fully electric vehicles.

I see them both all the time driving around the Maryland suburbs of Washington, DC. But then, this is a fairly big (and affluent with all those government, lobbyist, and "private" consulting jobs) EV place (see lots more Teslas than anything else) with lots of local charging locations.

As for the Explorer's (and Aviator's) problems, about what you would expect given the well-documented problems that have long plagued the Chicago facility where they are built.

Initially I was disappointed that the 2024 Nautilus I have on order wasn't going to be made in North America by union labor. Now, I'm kind of glad that it won't be. Though the Canadian union doesn't seem to have gone nuts like the UAW.

The ongoing build-out of national charging networks, especially the Tesla network, will solve #2 in the not-too-distant future for the bulk of drivers in most parts of the country. Prices will eventually come down with the next (or possibly the one after that) generation of batteries, solving #3. That's not an issue for me, as I'm a Lincoln driver, but it most certainly is for most folks. However, #1 is the big one. Less than half of all Americans have garages. Making EV ownership a good option for the huge number of folks who live in apartments, condos, townhouses, or rentals that don't provide access to at-home charging will take a while. This is the issue with me. I am the perfect candidate for going all EV even with only one vehicle in the family. My driving is mostly local. I put on much less than 10k miles a year. While I do take occasional long road trips -- maybe a couple or three a year -- the build-out of charging networks would probably soon remove that most of that concern, at least for me. But I will not own a plug-in vehicle as long as I lack the ability to plug it in at home.

FMC hasn't said much about it other than it than while it is a 2.0 turbo, it is not exactly the same as the non-hybrid 2.0 turbo base engine (though the differences are likely minor).

Nor is the new 2024 Lincoln Nautilus hybrid.

That is only true very recently, as in the last few months. Looking back a decade or more wages in general across the economy have not kept up with the cost of living. It is often referred to as the middle class squeeze.

That's great to hear. I just didn't see any in retail parking lots nor did I run across charging sites in my usual driving around, like I'm used to. In the Washington DC metro area they seem to be all over the place. North Carolina is definitely moving forward more slowly than the area where I live, but the important thing is that it is moving forward. The problem remains that I won't get an EV until I'm able to do home charging, and that is likely to be a few years down the road still.

I am a prospective consumer whose vehicle needs are met by a 2-row (not 3-row, not compact) crossover. But a great number of consumers who are exactly like me won't test drive a MME, nor should we, because we lack the ability based on where we live to do home charging. Otherwise, I would be a good candidate to go BEV. Though I must say, I am just back from a week driving around North Carolina (and to and from NC from the DC area) and, unlike the Washington area, I saw virtually no charging stations (or even charging parking spaces outside supermarkets like I see here) on my trip. I did see a few Teslas in and about the Charlotte area, however, so I'm sure you can find them in the bigger cities. In Hickory, NC where I was staying for a few days? Not so much.

Unless Lincoln wants to drop down to just 3 vehicles after next year (if the reports are accurate), they could always do the Nautilus thing and import the Corsair from China, where the vehicle continues to get updates, where it is well supported with smart marketing, and where it sells well. Thinking about it, the 2024 Nautilus might be so much more refined because it was originally designed just for the Chinese market. An imported Corsair might similarly benefit. Lincoln in North America looks increasingly like an afterthought.

Here's an article from Ford Authority reporting on the 2024 Nautilus' official launch in China (where Job 1 is just a couple of weeks away). It gets into some of the points I made in my earlier post. That is, Lincoln is increasingly a make focused on the Chinese domestic market, where most Lincoln's now get sold. There, Lincoln has vehicles not found in North America (the Zepher), and a number of configurations not seen here (such as rear seat executive packages and the Centennial SVP line-up). In China, Lincoln is considered a youth-oriented brand. Unlike the Ford brand, which is languishing, the Lincoln brand has experienced rapid growth. https://fordauthority.com/2023/08/lincoln-nautilus-hybrid-officially-launches-in-china/

That may be true for mass market hybrid buyers, but not luxury car buyers, like Lincoln customers. The strange thing is that in China, where the Lincoln brand has really caught on (and which is now Lincoln's largest market, surpassing North American sales a few years ago), it is for whatever reason particularly sought after by younger car buyers. To overgeneralize things, in North America Lincoln is considered a brand for well-off oldsters. In China it is considered a brand for affluent hipsters. Another difference between the two markets, and you see it in the options Lincoln provides in the two markets, is that in China affluent car buyers often have a driver on staff. That's why Lincoln in China provides back-seat executive packages you don't see in North America, as well as an actual executive sedan.

Actually, there was a several year period, starting with the release of the new Continental, followed by new Navigator, the revised and rebadged Nautilus, the white-space Aviator and the new Corsair, when Lincoln really seemed to be on a roll. Then covid hit, the planned all-new Nautilus was canceled (only to be revived a few years later as a China-exclusive, then revised further as both that and an import for North America) the Rivian flagship EV was canceled, and now Ford announces the cheshiring of the ICE-based Corsair and Aviator along with an announcement that the company is basically getting out of the business of 2-row crossovers. Well, SUVs/crossovers are all Lincoln has. If there's to be no 2-row crossovers then we're looking at just the EV Aviator replacement and the Navigator. There may well be other product in the pipeline we don't know about. If so, this is a replay of Ford's mistake announcing the end of sedans without discussing what new products they had in the works in their stead.

Thanks for sharing. Wow, things in Lincoln-land look pretty dismal. It was only a few years ago that Lincoln had great ambitions to grow their market share, grow their line-up, and strongly encourage Lincoln dealerships to become Lincoln-only. I have the 2024 hybrid Nautilus on order. Will probably still go through with it. But looking forward, my guess is that Lincoln will become to Ford what Buick is to GM. A make that is mainly focused on the China market, where it is quite popular, and still exists in North America (to the extent it does) only because of that.

Actually, all Lincoln EVs will come equipped for full access to the Tesla charging network. Ford's CEO struck that deal a few months ago with Musk. Starting next year all Ford and (eventually) Lincoln EVs will be produced using the Tesla port for charging. That said, there is still a lot of work that needs to be done to make long EV road trips less problematic.

Dang paywall. But thanks for the extensive subject line which, I suppose, does a good job summarizing the article.

So, is the hybrid version of the 2024 Nautilus for China's domestic market a PHEV, while the version for North America is a traditional hybrid?