Ford says "screw it", we're only selling two cars by 2020 in North America. Trucks, trucks, and trucks.

Pretty crazy.  Dropping pretty much everything.   I'd have loved to have listened in on those data meetings and theories.  They'll cut operating expenses by 25.5. billion.   Does that mean job cuts?   Taurus, Fiesta, Fusion, C-Max and Focus sedans all going buh bye.

Only Mustang and Focus crossover make the cut

Technically they won't be "selling" those that make the cut either. They may be "leasing" them, however.

Will anyone actually notice when they're gone? Those are all pretty boring cars, almost as boring as the Focus.

My guess is that this is related to changes in fuel economy standards, since the auto makers really make money on trucks & SUV's, IMO they were selling cars to meet the requirements. Which, as an example, is why the Volt was kept around - it was a placeholder electric hybrid to show off to the "green" people but it also allowed GM to sell more gas guzzlers.

I've often thought Chrysler could have done much better selling Ram trucks, mini-vans, and Jeeps, but they need to sell their crappy cars to meet standards.

Somehow Ford must think they will be able to meet the 2020 standards, or that they will change them.

Found this - don't really know what it all means, but lots of words, data and charts
https://www.epa.gov/fuel-economy-trends/highlights-co2-and-fuel-economy-trends

Made me think of that lyric in that Poison song Talk Dirty to Me

At the drive in
In the old man's Ford

I imagine, if administrations change and the country does a 180 and makes the standards tougher again, Ford knows it' can switch over factories pretty quickly. I'm thinking they won't tell their design teams to take a hike, and they'll keep doing what they do. In this day and age when flipping factories is probably easier than it once was, this isn't as big of a leap of faith as we think. Or at least I think. My wife's cousin is one of those guys that has to sometimes flip a factory. When I was haivng beers and semi interested in what he was saying, it seemed before in the 90's getting the machines on an assembly line to go from grabbing frames, fenders, engines whatnot and turning and twisting with them using space available was probably a shit load tougher than it is now.

steveschneider wrote:Made me think of that lyric in that Poison song Talk Dirty to Me

At the drive in
In the old man's Ford

that is some damn fine songwriting right there.

Been thinking about getting a truck. Have no real need for it, but I bet it would look cool...especially if I put a YETI sticker on the back window.

DWags wrote:I imagine, if administrations change and the country does a 180 and makes the standards tougher again, Ford knows it' can switch over factories pretty quickly. I'm thinking they won't tell their design teams to take a hike, and they'll keep doing what they do. In this day and age when flipping factories is probably easier than it once was, this isn't as big of a leap of faith as we think. Or at least I think. My wife's cousin is one of those guys that has to sometimes flip a factory. When I was haivng beers and semi interested in what he was saying, it seemed before in the 90's getting the machines on an assembly line to go from grabbing frames, fenders, engines whatnot and turning and twisting with them using space available was probably a shit load tougher than it is now.

Hopefully we won't force corporations to lose money making products that people don't want to buy. Just makes no sense whatever stripe you are.

I thought all there was is trucks down in Georgia?

When I lived in michigan there was a pretty bitter rivalry between the ford and Chevy fans. Is that still going on?

Robert J Sakimano wrote:

steveschneider wrote:Made me think of that lyric in that Poison song Talk Dirty to Me

At the drive in
In the old man's Ford

that is some damn fine songwriting right there.

Yeah, the dude was a poet. I only know his words because their stuff was on constant rotation on the classic rock stations.


They say I spend my money on women and wine
But I couldn't tell you where I spent last night

steveschneider wrote:

Robert J Sakimano wrote:
that is some damn fine songwriting right there.

Yeah, the dude was a poet. I only know his words because their stuff was on constant rotation on the classic rock stations.


They say I spend my money on women and wine
But I couldn't tell you where I spent last night

LooseGoose wrote:

DWags wrote:I imagine, if administrations change and the country does a 180 and makes the standards tougher again, Ford knows it' can switch over factories pretty quickly. I'm thinking they won't tell their design teams to take a hike, and they'll keep doing what they do. In this day and age when flipping factories is probably easier than it once was, this isn't as big of a leap of faith as we think. Or at least I think. My wife's cousin is one of those guys that has to sometimes flip a factory. When I was haivng beers and semi interested in what he was saying, it seemed before in the 90's getting the machines on an assembly line to go from grabbing frames, fenders, engines whatnot and turning and twisting with them using space available was probably a shit load tougher than it is now.

Hopefully we won't force corporations to lose money making products that people don't want to buy. Just makes no sense whatever stripe you are.

Yup, I'll just go buy foreign. Getting 35+ MPG is important to me. I'd rather waste money on something else other than gas.

InTenSity wrote:

LooseGoose wrote:

Hopefully we won't force corporations to lose money making products that people don't want to buy. Just makes no sense whatever stripe you are.

Yup, I'll just go buy foreign. Getting 35+ MPG is important to me. I'd rather waste money on something else other than gas.

The smarter thing for everyone, the foreign companies do a better job on the small cars.

DWags wrote:I thought all there was is trucks down in Georgia?

Lots of people driving around in Jeeps also.

NigelUno wrote:

DWags wrote:I thought all there was is trucks down in Georgia?

Lots of people driving around in Jeeps also.

flying into ATL in June for a wedding. Rented a hybrid car of some sort. Not for any good reason, really, other than to send my knuckle-draggin' relatives into a rage.

Robert J Sakimano wrote:

NigelUno wrote:

Lots of people driving around in Jeeps also.

flying into ATL in June for a wedding. Rented a hybrid car of some sort. Not for any good reason, really, other than to send my knuckle-draggin' relatives into a rage.

Typical tree hugger - flies with huge carbon footprint, soothes his conscience by renting government subsidized hybrid to erase 1/10,000th of jet footprint and considers it a bonus to needlessly upset people on someone's special weekend.

LooseGoose wrote:

Robert J Sakimano wrote: flying into ATL in June for a wedding. Rented a hybrid car of some sort. Not for any good reason, really, other than to send my knuckle-draggin' relatives into a rage.

Typical tree hugger - flies with huge carbon footprint, soothes his conscience by renting government subsidized hybrid to erase 1/10,000th of jet footprint and considers it a bonus to needlessly upset people on someone's special weekend.

thanks for the trial run and confirming that it will, indeed, send them into a rage.

I'm thinking about leasing a BMW i3...

Thoughts?

LooseGoose wrote:

Robert J Sakimano wrote: flying into ATL in June for a wedding. Rented a hybrid car of some sort. Not for any good reason, really, other than to send my knuckle-draggin' relatives into a rage.

Typical tree hugger - flies with huge carbon footprint, soothes his conscience by renting government subsidized hybrid to erase 1/10,000th of jet footprint and considers it a bonus to needlessly upset people on someone's special weekend.

I think Hannity has a hybrid SUV.

Your thoughts, Goose?

steveschneider wrote:I'm thinking about leasing a BMW i3...

Thoughts?

Is that one of those little electric ones?

Robert J Sakimano wrote:

LooseGoose wrote:

Typical tree hugger - flies with huge carbon footprint, soothes his conscience by renting government subsidized hybrid to erase 1/10,000th of jet footprint and considers it a bonus to needlessly upset people on someone's special weekend.

thanks for the trial run and confirming that it will, indeed, send them into a rage.

Pointing out tree hugger hypocrisy is far from a rage my granola crunching friend.

LooseGoose wrote:

Robert J Sakimano wrote: thanks for the trial run and confirming that it will, indeed, send them into a rage.

Pointing out tree hugger hypocrisy is far from a rage my granola crunching friend.

it seemed to annoy you. Which is my goal with the knuckle-draggin' in-laws.

steveschneider wrote:I'm thinking about leasing a BMW i3...

Thoughts?

I bet it goes well with khakis.

LooseGoose wrote:

Robert J Sakimano wrote: thanks for the trial run and confirming that it will, indeed, send them into a rage.

Pointing out tree hugger hypocrisy is far from a rage my granola crunching friend.

You got all of that out of Bob renting a hybrid?

NigelUno wrote:

steveschneider wrote:I'm thinking about leasing a BMW i3...

Thoughts?

Is that one of those little electric ones?

Yeah, my wife’s company is offering to lease us a car. They have a 100 Mile range but they seem like it would be good for commuting and driving around the town. Fuck paying for gas.

NigelUno wrote:

LooseGoose wrote:

Pointing out tree hugger hypocrisy is far from a rage my granola crunching friend.

You got all of that out of Bob renting a hybrid?

not exactly proud of it, but I'm not at all any sort of tree-huggin' hippie.. my daughter and wife sort of force me to be conscientious about things.

steveschneider wrote:

NigelUno wrote:

Is that one of those little electric ones?

Yeah, my wife’s company is offering to lease us a car. They have a 100 Mile range but they seem like it would be good for commuting and driving around the town. Fuck paying for gas.

;-) Pay for electricity produced from burning gas. Beat the man!

LooseGoose wrote:
;-)  Pay for electricity produced from burning gas.   Beat the man!

Fuck paying for electricity - I'm getting a car with solar panels for the hood/roof/deck lid and windmills to produce energy as I drive down the road.
Watch those knuckle-draggers heads explode

like this


or this


oh, and I almost forgot these
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Robert J Sakimano wrote:

NigelUno wrote:

Lots of people driving around in Jeeps also.  

flying into ATL in June for a wedding. Rented a hybrid car of some sort. Not for any good reason, really, other than to send my knuckle-draggin' relatives into a rage.

Went to Florida a few weeks ago to visit relatives. I got upgraded to a 4x4 pickup truck at the rental place. I thought all the relatives were going to give me a handy when I showed up driving that thing.

I'd wager that by 2020 Trucks will be getting damn good gas miles anyway. Engineers are amazing, and Goose can complain about Obama forcing a goal on the companies, but I think the best and brightest in our country thrive on a challenge. Sure there are a ton of people pissed at a free enterprise system telling a company they have to do this or that, and I get that, but if you give smart peole a goal, They can get damn near it if not right on it if they need to. Without a goal, you take a deep breath and relax a bit.

steveschneider wrote:

NigelUno wrote:

Is that one of those little electric ones?

Yeah, my wife’s company is offering to lease us a car. They have a 100 Mile range but they seem like it would be good for commuting and driving around the town. Fuck paying for gas.

Put $65 in the Tahoe yesterday. I might start collecting french fry oil and see if that works instead.

My brother in law has a buddy that is an environmental lawyer. he converted his Benz into a car that runs on old cooking grease. Smells like burger king going down the road.

Jake from State Farm wrote:

Robert J Sakimano wrote:
flying into ATL in June for a wedding. Rented a hybrid car of some sort. Not for any good reason, really, other than to send my knuckle-draggin' relatives into a rage.

Went to Florida a few weeks ago to visit relatives. I got upgraded to a 4x4 pickup truck at the rental place. I thought all the relatives were going to give me a handy when I showed up driving that thing.

DWags wrote:I'd wager that by 2020 Trucks will be getting damn good gas miles anyway. Engineers are amazing, and Goose can complain about Obama forcing a goal on the companies, but I think the best and brightest in our country thrive on a challenge. Sure there are a ton of people pissed at a free enterprise system telling a company they have to do this or that, and I get that, but if you give smart peole a goal, They can get damn near it if not right on it if they need to. Without a goal, you take a deep breath and relax a bit.

Obama? It goes all the way back to Nixon....

Here's the thing Wags and I know I've seen studies that support this....how many lives was it worth?

The simple fact is that people in small cars die at a much higher rate. The cost for those better fleet gas mileages has been paid in the blood of Americans.

So was it worth it for loved ones to die to save a few gallons of oil?

LooseGoose wrote:

DWags wrote:I'd wager that by 2020 Trucks will be getting damn good gas miles anyway.   Engineers are amazing, and Goose can complain about Obama forcing a goal on the companies, but I think the best and brightest in our country thrive on a challenge.  Sure there are a ton of people pissed at a free enterprise system telling a company they have to do this or that, and I get that, but if you give smart peole a goal, They can get damn near it if not right on it if they need to.   Without a goal, you take a deep breath and relax a bit.  

Obama?  It goes all the way back to Nixon....

Here's the thing Wags and I know I've seen studies that support this....how many lives was it worth?  

The simple fact is that people in small cars die at a much higher rate.   The cost for those better fleet gas mileages has been paid in the blood of Americans.    

So was it worth it for loved ones to die to save a few gallons of oil?

I don't own a car.

(side note: ya gotta admit.. it's pretty funny seeing the big burly dudes driving trucks and SUV's with an "I Support the Troops" yellow magnetic ribbon on the back.

So, wait goose, If I'm reading your post right, you're blaming cars for people's deaths?

hmmmm.

Let
Me
Think
About
That.

hmmmmmmmmm

People aren't killing people in cars, cars are killing people in cars.

something
something
Something
SOMETHING!

What is it this reminds me of?

I think you're right, we need to take small cars away from people to save people's lives.



But wait, what if we just had people keep buying more small cars? The only way you save a life from a bad small car owner, is if you have a good small car owner.

O.K., sorry I binned this up. Just wanted to make a point about how I think, given a problem, engineers can solve it if you tell them it has to be solved by this date. I just think they can do almost anything. I've always been in awe of those fuckers.

DWags wrote:My brother in law has a buddy that is an environmental lawyer. he converted his Benz into a car that runs on old cooking grease. Smells like burger king going down the road.

Is his name Ben Giovanelli or something like that?