There will be a point in time when EVs are going to be the overwhelming majority, but that future is not nearly as close as some would like to think. In fact, it'll take many decades to reach that point. Too many people are resistant to change and will be buying ICE vehicles for a long time to come. To cut our ICE production off at the knees to boost our EV capabilities at this point in time is a huge mistake we're going to pay for dearly, in my opinion.
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If I wanted a reliable EV I would buy a golf cart before any F product
Why has no one on this thread mentioned that we won't have oil forever and that's the main reason people are starting to shift now. Because the current source is finite...
One positive thing about bankruptcy would be that the Ford family would loose their preferred shares.
Folks, we may not have a choice in all of this. It seems all of the automakers are on the green political narrative so we may not have many ICE engine choices left, even in the relative near term. The fact that EV's are nothing more than a curiosity to the well off is just details.
How many times do we see companies roll out one garbage product after the other in hopes they gain the early/first mover strategy or some political favoritism? Or they do so simply because they can. If all of the automakers go down this road at once, we as consumers won't have a choice. I think the full court press centers more around the race to the biggest/loudest bragging rights around doing the most for the environment with everything else as secondary. After all, if we don't wipe every ICE engine off the face of the planet in the next two milliseconds, we won't have a planet to to host these EV problems we're all articulating, right? Right???
I am an Engineer working on EVs
I will not buy one until 2035 minimum
Too many f*ing problems no one wants to talk about
Because if you do you are going to be cut
So working on changing industry before this house of cards collapses
@dmg+1irWThFH maybe if you got your information from somewhere other than Facebook memes you’d know how silly you sound, but please by all means let the brain rot continue
EVs are like going back to horse and buggy days. Takes 1-3 hours to feed, water, and reenergize your horse so EV owners are just doing that, except sipping lattes instead of feeding oats.
need to rekindle the mazda partnership so we have some gas engines at the ready. contingency plans.
https://insidemazda.mazdausa.com/the-mazda-way/technology/mazdas-skyactiv-x-breaks-cover/
from that link:
"...but the internal combustion engine will continue to be the base power unit for 85 percent of all cars up until 2035."
sounds about right
Thought this was an interesting read.
https://www.washingtonexaminer.com/opinion/theres-only-one-customer-for-electric-vehicles
"we may start seeing scheduled power outages."
Oh you're wrong my friend. Thats where our F150 Lightning and Mach E can help backfeed the grid and prevent blackouts. /sarc
"At a minimum, we need a new battery technology with much greater power density than lithium-ion with the ability to fast charge from minimum to 100% in an hour."
An hour? How long does it take to accept my credit card payment and pump 20 gallons of gas? That is the target for battery charge time. So as you said batteries arent even close today in an understatement.
As we transition into EV more and more people will use electricity, power grid will become stretched to the point we may start seeing scheduled power outages. On top of that, the cost of electricity will go up and who’d be paying for it? Us, the consumers. We’ll be paying so much to charge EV cars, we’ll wish we could go back to gas vehicles. Just my thought here…
Couple of comments regarding posts on this page...
First, with respect to Henry Ford's electrical projects, I would point out that H. Ford had no training or knowledge of electrical power and was probably getting all his ideas from his good friend Thomas Edison. Edison, although a brilliant inventor, was not always right. Edison championed DC power grids vs. AC by Westinghouse and clearly, long distance DC power transmission is simply not workable (ohm's law proves it).
Second, I think all those (including state of CA) who are publishing date mandates to completely drop ICE in favor of EV, do not understand all the technical issues that we have no solutions for currently. Neither current battery technology nor the existing power grid required to charge them up overnight, is up to the task of everyone using EVs for all their transportation needs. At a minimum, we need a new battery technology with much greater power density than lithium-ion with the ability to fast charge from minimum to 100% in an hour. Today's batteries are not even close to meeting the need.
This is what I think of.
https://localwiki.org/wyandotte/Henry_Ford%27s_electric_railroad
Henry Ford's electric railroad
Arch structures such as these along the border of Allen Park and Melvindale are one of a number that continue to stand along Canadian National tracks in central Downriver left over from Henry Ford's failed attempt to electrify his Detroit, Toledo and Ironton Railroad. Photo from detroit1701.org/Ren Farley
In July of 1920, following a three-year United States government takeover of the railroad system, automotive pioneer Henry Ford purchased the local Detroit, Toledo and Ironton (DT&I) railroad spur, in the hopes of extending the line into his burgeoning Rouge factory complex. Most factory goods were being shipped to Rouge by rail, and Mr. Ford disliked the high fees the various railroad companies would charge for freight distribution.
Mr. Ford was branching out into other areas of interest beyond automobiles, possessing a vision of redefining how railroads would operate; including but not limited to: reducing shipper's tariffs significantly, cutting labor costs, eliminating many work rules, and eliminating the majority of the lawyers working in conjunction with the railways.
His enthusiasm was evident, but his practical experience in the rail industry was lacking, and he would eventually sell out his interest within a decade.
One of the frugal Mr. Ford's main concerns was the increasing cost of petroleum, which he sought to end on his rail route, running from Ironton, Ohio, through Lima and Springfield, toward Detroit. His solution, announced in 1923, was to electrify the railway with electricity produced at his factory complex, eliminating the need for more expensive steam. It would be part of a larger plan to eventually electrify the entire route, which he would then link to railways through Charleston, West Virginia and on to Newport News, Virginia.
Bypassing the need to build power substations throughout the route to keep voltage steady, he erected the catenary arches which remain prevalent today. The arches were completed from the Rouge complex to the village of Carleton. Foundations were built to continue the arches further to near the interchange with the Ann Arbor Railroad in the small hamlet of Diann, south of Dundee, but they were never completed.
The experiment -- which involved a high voltage line strung above the arches, through a substation-like structure on top of each engine to step down the voltage, then convert it to DC current which actually ran the engine -- was not a success. The first engines began running the line in 1927 but were pulled out of service in 1930, one year after Mr. Ford sold his interest to the Pennroad Corporation. In a cruel irony of sorts, Pennroad's analysis determined operating costs could be reduced -- by converting the line back to steam power.
Soon afterwards, demolition crews had started to demolish most of the arches, but then gave up the insurmountable task of removing them due to their impervious construction: a total of 190 cubic yards of concrete were used just to create the bases for each arch.
What is left of the arches
Four sets of arches remain today. The longest extends from just south of Oakwood Junction and just west of the western end of Russell Street in Allen Park south to between Penford Crossing and Superior Boulevard in Taylor. However, that set has three gaps: two where only the foundations remain and another near the Pelham Road Railroad Crossing where the remains of an arch lie in a pond next to the track. Another set remains at Oakwood Junction itself. Yet another remains at Oakwood Boulevard and the fourth remains between Eureka Road and Pennsylvania Road.
" In fact, it'll take many decades to reach that point."
That seems to ignore the rate of change we have seen thus far. I agree that there is a balance between ICE/EV that needs to be reached but the pace of adoption has far exceeded projections.
Further, future government restrictions (Europe and California) necessitate becoming heavy in the EV space in the near to medium future.
Too soon. Are you kidding me?
Ford is 6 years behind Tesla and 4 years behind the other automotive companies.
Ford will never be ahead of the game.
@OP. I am not even sure that EVs are going to be the majority one day. When we run out of oil/gas, the only stable source of energy will be nuclear. How are going to mine the battery minerals w/o ICE? How are going to pave the streets w/o ICE? Is there enough minerals to create enough batteries to replace all ICE vehicles? It will be cheaper to develop mass transit systems, than to maintain EVs.
Some people like to say EVs are like ICE was for horse buggies, but that's an stupid thing to say. The paradigm was completed shattered with ICE, that brought so many changes and improvements (like not having to care for horses in your own home). There is nothing an EV can do, that cannot be done with ICE, while EVs still fall short on certain key areas (like range/recharge/payload). The proof is in the number of households that buy EVs as a second, third or fourth vehicle (Over 90%), vs having only EVs (less than 10%).
Government was not needed for ICE development, nor for building the infrastructure. People realized the advantages, and migrated to ICE. Because EVs are a losing proposition, most people refuse to migrate. Now we have the Blue Party forcing the adoption of EVs to harvest the crazy green b@stards votes. The EV push is all based in politics, not economics.
Of course, FMC is going to suffer economically, maybe going bankrupt, with the EV push. First of all, it depends enormously of the government's good will, which can change in the next couple of years. Secondly, FMC is a late comer to the party (where Tesla is already established and Chinese companies are growing faster). Thirdly, FMC is trying to compete in the wrong market with the wrong brand name (EVs are considered luxury market, while the Ford brand is not associated to luxury. Ergo, it should be using the Lincoln brand name for the EV push, but since the Lincoln brand has been so badly managed, most buyers do not even consider it an option in luxury buying.) Additionally, the move of concentrating all efforts in EV, while destroying the ICE business, is (and will continue) alienating a lot of customers.
So yes, I do believe FMC is going down this time for good. This will be the last of so many errors, an error that the company won't be able to recover from. Sorry for all the NA workers, but let's be honest here: the company doesn't want them anyway and it is moving all work outside US, including UAW work. Let's look at the silver lining: Detroit Lions may actually win.
The rush seems to be political as gop may not welcome layoffs and ev .