Ford Considers Axing Car Feature That Could Save Company Millions Per Year

[atomcat68]

On 2/12/2024 at 8:37 PM, silvrsvt said:

 

In the grand scheme of things when do things actually get cheaper? Only if you downsize or order less options. But there are so many variables with that too. 

 

Lets put this way, I had this really cool indicator thing on my 1986 Escort GT

 

 

Never had a car again with it...did I miss it? Nope. Some of the stuff moved to the dashboard, but never had a brake/Tail light or Headlight out indicator ever again.  

I actually liked that thing on my EXP! It had the light test button to make sure the warning lights worked. They were probably worried that the light test button wouldn't work and need to have a test for that as well. 

The most bizarre thing was the fuel filler door release was in the glove box, so you had to lean across the car to open it. A button behind a door to release another door.

[Gurgeh]

The 2025 Aviator now joins the list.

 

https://fordauthority.com/2024/04/2025-lincoln-aviator-also-drops-active-park-assist-2-0/

"The refreshed 2025 Lincoln Aviator just debuted in early February, bringing with it some revised styling elements inside and out, along with a host of new features such as the Lincoln Digital Experience infotainment software, bigger screens, and a revamped interior with new niceties – albeit at higher prices. 2025 Lincoln Aviator production is currently scheduled to kick off at the Chicago Assembly plant in May, but now, Ford Authority has learned that it will be missing one feature, in particular – Active Park Assist 2.0...

 

"As Ford Authority reported this past February, The Blue Oval has been muling the removal of automated parallel parking from its Active Park Assist feature in general, as COO Kumar Galhotra noted on the automaker’s Q4 2024 earnings call with investors that this is one of a few seldomly-used features that the automaker plans to remove as it aims to trim another $2 billion in costs from its bottom line. In fact, removing this feature alone could potentially save the automaker a whopping $10 million annually."

[Andrew L]

4 minutes ago, Gurgeh said:

The 2025 Aviator now joins the list.

 

https://fordauthority.com/2024/04/2025-lincoln-aviator-also-drops-active-park-assist-2-0/

"The refreshed 2025 Lincoln Aviator just debuted in early February, bringing with it some revised styling elements inside and out, along with a host of new features such as the Lincoln Digital Experience infotainment software, bigger screens, and a revamped interior with new niceties – albeit at higher prices. 2025 Lincoln Aviator production is currently scheduled to kick off at the Chicago Assembly plant in May, but now, Ford Authority has learned that it will be missing one feature, in particular – Active Park Assist 2.0...

 

"As Ford Authority reported this past February, The Blue Oval has been muling the removal of automated parallel parking from its Active Park Assist feature in general, as COO Kumar Galhotra noted on the automaker’s Q4 2024 earnings call with investors that this is one of a few seldomly-used features that the automaker plans to remove as it aims to trim another $2 billion in costs from its bottom line. In fact, removing this feature alone could potentially save the automaker a whopping $10 million annually."

 

I thought it would have made sense to drop this feature on Fords but keep it on Lincolns as an option but I guess they are just going to drop it across the board all together.  I know I will get the response of "IT COSTS MONEY TO MAKE IT DOESNT MAKE SENSE TO HAVE IT" but when you see cars like Kias having features like that and a 90k Lincoln does not have it then it just doesn't seem right.  IMO.

[escapeman]

Lincoln kept this feature on the new Nautilus for 24. 
I would not be at all surprised to see it deleted as well for 25. As they kept it on 24s to make a marketing splash. Only way I see it kept is if the Chinese use it , as country of origin is China.  

[Motorpsychology]

I suppose APA is useful if you typically find yourself having to parallel park a couple-few times a week. On the other hand, you probably are pretty good at it if that's the case. 

 

I read somewhere, probably on BOF, that Ford Connect relays the frequency and in some cases duration that an option is used. They found through this data mining that few people were using the Homelink garage door feature, continuing to use the clip-on box that came with the garage door opener. They concluded that money could be saved by deleting the feature on some models, or moving it up into a premium package. 

[rmc523]

2 hours ago, Chrisgb said:

I suppose APA is useful if you typically find yourself having to parallel park a couple-few times a week. On the other hand, you probably are pretty good at it if that's the case. 

 

I read somewhere, probably on BOF, that Ford Connect relays the frequency and in some cases duration that an option is used. They found through this data mining that few people were using the Homelink garage door feature, continuing to use the clip-on box that came with the garage door opener. They concluded that money could be saved by deleting the feature on some models, or moving it up into a premium package. 

 

I'll stand by my opinion that removing features, especially while simultaneously raising prices, isn't a good look.

[joseodiaga4]

5 hours ago, Gurgeh said:

The 2025 Aviator now joins the list.

 

https://fordauthority.com/2024/04/2025-lincoln-aviator-also-drops-active-park-assist-2-0/

"The refreshed 2025 Lincoln Aviator just debuted in early February, bringing with it some revised styling elements inside and out, along with a host of new features such as the Lincoln Digital Experience infotainment software, bigger screens, and a revamped interior with new niceties – albeit at higher prices. 2025 Lincoln Aviator production is currently scheduled to kick off at the Chicago Assembly plant in May, but now, Ford Authority has learned that it will be missing one feature, in particular – Active Park Assist 2.0...

 

"As Ford Authority reported this past February, The Blue Oval has been muling the removal of automated parallel parking from its Active Park Assist feature in general, as COO Kumar Galhotra noted on the automaker’s Q4 2024 earnings call with investors that this is one of a few seldomly-used features that the automaker plans to remove as it aims to trim another $2 billion in costs from its bottom line. In fact, removing this feature alone could potentially save the automaker a whopping $10 million annually."

it doesn't make any sense to take it out of Lincoln vehicles, specially the biggest models like the Aviator and Navigator.

Also as RMC says, removing features while increasing the price isn't good

Edited April 5, 2024 by joseodiaga4

[chrisholland03]

I had the system on my Corsair and have it on my Nautilus.  The Corsair's system worked better than it does on my Nautilus.  It could get into a space in 2-3 steps consistently, whereas my Nautilus frequently requires 3-5 steps.  

 

That said, having to hold the park assist button to make the vehicle move in the Corsair was extremely inconvenient and illogical.  The more traditional system in the Nautilus where you operate the brake works better.  

 

Additionally, in both cars it takes too many button presses to get the system up and running.  

 

All that to say is I like the feature, but I like for it to work well and be easy to use.

[Roland]

On 4/5/2024 at 1:17 PM, rmc523 said:

 

I'll stand by my opinion that removing features, especially while simultaneously raising prices, isn't a good look.

 

Classic Ford decontenting.   Makes me miss my Contour SVT.

[transitman]

I have it now and had it on an Escape several years ago. There's little need for it where I live and only used it once on the Escape to check it out. It made me nervous, but it worked perfectly. I did use the perpendicular parking feature just the other day on my 2020 Edge Titanium. Once again, it made me nervous, but it worked perfectly. I can imagine using it more often.

[AM222]

On 4/6/2024 at 1:22 AM, joseodiaga4 said:

it doesn't make any sense to take it out of Lincoln vehicles, specially the biggest models like the Aviator and Navigator.

Also as RMC says, removing features while increasing the price isn't good

Extra $$ saved to offset the continuous recalls of North American-built Fords?

[ARTIST 1950]

On 2/8/2024 at 10:56 AM, silvrsvt said:

In all seriousness, with the additional sensors that are part of Ford Co-Pilot360™ Assist+, I wouldn't think the cost savings would be that great.

Take it off along with some of the other bells and whistles and give me back a cd player. I have over 400 cd’s that are useless in either of my Ford vehicles . How much is Sirius paying the auto industry to leave us in the lurch! After all you PAY for that radio and get little choice in hearing what you want or like! Why do they think we bought CD in the first place? And lastly, my Ford products won’t play music from anything other than thumb drives, no EXTERNAL HD where I keep most of my music. 
yes, this is a very sore spot !!

[akirby]

3 hours ago, ARTIST 1950 said:

Take it off along with some of the other bells and whistles and give me back a cd player. I have over 400 cd’s that are useless in either of my Ford vehicles . How much is Sirius paying the auto industry to leave us in the lurch! After all you PAY for that radio and get little choice in hearing what you want or like! Why do they think we bought CD in the first place? And lastly, my Ford products won’t play music from anything other than thumb drives, no EXTERNAL HD where I keep most of my music. 
yes, this is a very sore spot !!

Just copy the music to a couple of large thumb drives.  I think the problem with the hard drive is there isn’t enough power from the usb.

[Motorpsychology]

14 hours ago, ARTIST 1950 said:

Take it off along with some of the other bells and whistles and give me back a cd player. I have over 400 cd’s that are useless in either of my Ford vehicles . How much is Sirius paying the auto industry to leave us in the lurch! After all you PAY for that radio and get little choice in hearing what you want or like! Why do they think we bought CD in the first place? And lastly, my Ford products won’t play music from anything other than thumb drives, no EXTERNAL HD where I keep most of my music. 
yes, this is a very sore spot !!

I agree that Sirius XM should be an option. I didn't renew my subscription after the free trial ended. I use my iTunes app (also subscription based) thru Apple Car Play- 64 million tunes plus the ones in my library. I can buy songs or whole albums in the Ranger or at home or not buy and just listen. Good for podcasts, they never butt in and remind you every 2 or 3 tuned that your listening to  iTunes, no extra hardware, and sound quality has improved over the years. It can be controlled with "Hey Siri" and the voice button on the steering wheel

Edited July 31, 2024 by Chrisgb

[akirby]

23 minutes ago, Chrisgb said:

I agree that Sirius XM should be an option. I didn't renew my subscription after the free trial ended. I use my iTunes app (also subscription based) thru Apple Car Play- 64 million tunes plus the ones in my library. I can buy songs or whole albums in the Ranger or at home or not buy and just listen. Good for podcasts, they never butt in and remind you every 2 or 3 tuned that your listening to  iTunes, no extra hardware, and sound quality has improved over the years. It can be controlled with "Hey Siri" and the voice button on the steering wheel

Only downside is if you’re in an area with poor or no cell reception, but that’s pretty rare these days in most areas.

 

The question I had about using the SiriusXM app or some other music service with CarPlay is whether you can channel surf with the steering wheel controls.  With sync 4 I can surf 24 channels and I do that a lot.  Although with some services you can probably mix all the favorite artists and genres and songs in one playlist so then it would just be going to the next song.

[ice-capades]

1 hour ago, Chrisgb said:

I agree that Sirius XM should be an option. I didn't renew my subscription after the free trial ended. I use my iTunes app (also subscription based) thru Apple Car Play- 64 million tunes plus the ones in my library. I can buy songs or whole albums in the Ranger or at home or not buy and just listen. Good for podcasts, they never butt in and remind you every 2 or 3 tuned that your listening to  iTunes, no extra hardware, and sound quality has improved over the years. It can be controlled with "Hey Siri" and the voice button on the steering wheel

 

For years, SiriusXM was free for the first year but IIRC it was cut to only the first 3 months some time ago. SiriusXM sends me regular offers to renew at only $5.00/month, but I pass on the offers as I'm not in the car long enough to bother renewing. I stream original recordings from my phone, almost exclusively from when I was a studio engineer in the entertainment business. 

[Sherminator98]

2 hours ago, akirby said:

The question I had about using the SiriusXM app or some other music service with CarPlay is whether you can channel surf with the steering wheel controls.  With sync 4 I can surf 24 channels and I do that a lot.  Although with some services you can probably mix all the favorite artists and genres and songs in one playlist so then it would just be going to the next song.

 

I can check, but I don't think you can?

[akirby]

1 hour ago, silvrsvt said:

 

I can check, but I don't think you can?

Didnt think so but I don’t use CarPlay so wasn’t sure.

[Sherminator98]

1 hour ago, akirby said:

Didnt think so but I don’t use CarPlay so wasn’t sure.

Since I’m siting in my car now, the only thing the steering wheels controls do is skip the currently playing song and adjust the volume 

[AGR]

8 hours ago, akirby said:

Only downside is if you’re in an area with poor or no cell reception, but that’s pretty rare these days in most areas.

 

 

Uh yeah. That's definitely something a person who lives East of the Mississippi would say. Cell coverage can be spotty even on the interstates in the West.

When driving across Wyoming on I-80, Sirius XM is a godsend.

[AGR]

20 hours ago, akirby said:

Just copy the music to a couple of large thumb drives.  I think the problem with the hard drive is there isn’t enough power from the usb.

Yep, or just load it on to your phone. I have about 6K songs on mine.

[Captainp4]

I just stream pandora through android auto. It's free and works for me around here. Cell service gets a little spotty in certain areas of WV when I head out that way, but someone else's phone usually has signal if mine doesn't. I'm sure you could add an external CD player in if it bothers you that much, but reality is the majority of people don't use CDs anymore.

[tbone]

11 hours ago, Chrisgb said:

I agree that Sirius XM should be an option. I didn't renew my subscription after the free trial ended. I use my iTunes app (also subscription based) thru Apple Car Play- 64 million tunes plus the ones in my library. I can buy songs or whole albums in the Ranger or at home or not buy and just listen. Good for podcasts, they never butt in and remind you every 2 or 3 tuned that your listening to  iTunes, no extra hardware, and sound quality has improved over the years. It can be controlled with "Hey Siri" and the voice button on the steering wheel

Im glad Sirius is standard, but as long as it remained an option I would be good to go. I love Sirius, even though we have iTunes.  I pay for it in two vehicles.  It’s pretty much set it and forget it on Octane, unless my wife is with me.  

[ANTAUS]

I have about 1.4 TB of music in a thumb drive, and on my MKZ its in this covered tray forward of the covered cupholders, not much of a clearance, this literally the size of my thumbnail.  Just going down searching thru the folders is a mission.  What does annoy me is that whenever I'm on the screen going thru folders, and a text or call comes in, BOOM reset, have to start from scratch on the screen.  I tend to do Pandora or Iheart Radio if I'm on a long 1 hour trip and don't want to "think" of what I want to listen to next, let them pick for me. Sometimes I have to check on some of my rentals in this nasty little county west of me called Lake County, and I get numerous dead zones, so it's back to USB thumb drive.

[akirby]

48 minutes ago, ANTAUS said:

I have about 1.4 TB of music in a thumb drive, and on my MKZ its in this covered tray forward of the covered cupholders, not much of a clearance, this literally the size of my thumbnail.  Just going down searching thru the folders is a mission.  What does annoy me is that whenever I'm on the screen going thru folders, and a text or call comes in, BOOM reset, have to start from scratch on the screen.  I tend to do Pandora or Iheart Radio if I'm on a long 1 hour trip and don't want to "think" of what I want to listen to next, let them pick for me. Sometimes I have to check on some of my rentals in this nasty little county west of me called Lake County, and I get numerous dead zones, so it's back to USB thumb drive.

Why use folders?   You can search by artist, album, song or genre using the tags in the mp3/mp4 files even if they’re all in the same directory with voice commands.  And you can create specific playlists.

Edited August 1, 2024 by akirby