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Scottaz76

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This is what I'm curious about as well. They specifically said on the livestream that they would need to move out all the currently built vehicles before they could iterate new models, so I took that to mean they would be pushing out the dirt mountain group before this. However, all other indications were that this wouldn't really start happening until October. As a result, I think what is most likely happening here is that they're planning to produce these FEs in advance and store them until the tops are ready.
exactly. This is complete bullshit!
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Ramble_Offroad

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So about the “redesigned MIC top”….what do we know about it other than nothing?

Really, do we have any facts?

“cosmetic” PR spin noted and disregarded.

- open edges / deamination
- honeycomb substrate showing through
- rattle box
- bowed panels
- A-Pilar leaks / drainage issues
- what else?
 

Papa Smurf

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Razorbak86

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So about the “redesigned MIC top”….what do we know about it other than nothing?

Really do we have any facts?

“cosmetic” PR spin noted and disregarded.
This is the best information I’ve seen so far, from a reliable source…

The design will look very much the same (and be the same color, to those of you asking). Main points to address in the update:

- Rolled /finished edges where there were formerly raw cuts.
- Thicker, more uniform outer layer of material.
- Improved injection process to fix forming issues in the clamshell.
 

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UberGadgetFreak

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My dealership has a First Edition "on the way" as of yesterday. If you're the person who ordered a Lightning Blue 4 Door First Edition with the black interior at "KHF", you probably already know it's somewhere in transit (site says in stock, but it's not. I wanted to look at it today and we had a nice chat about it.).

Looking at the window sticker, its blend date was 8/11, which means it was probably already committed to build when the top news came out. So maybe it fell through the cracks and hit transit before it could be stopped? They said they have a railcar number for it, so... it apparently skipped dirt mountain somehow and there's no way it has the new top this soon.

My understanding is that the new tops are scheduled to start around 9/20, but they could come earlier if miracles happen since it's not extremely major changes (thicker, better edges, forming method changes), but I won't hold my breath.

Mine has yet to be scheduled, and they told me I won't hear anything until mid-October at best. This kind of aligns with the estimate of taking 4 weeks of new tops being swapped to clear dirt mountain. I hope it goes faster than that though. I want to get out there in the wild!
 

mpeugeot

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So one a recent live stream it was suggested that 700 tops a day was a possibility... I nearly died laughing because these clowns haven't been able to produce even 100 tops a day of acceptable quality. They are suggesting that they can do 7 times that?!?!? If that was the case, the backlog would be cleared out in 21 to 24 days. There is no way in hell that they are going to build 700 acceptable tops per day.... not in the next 2 months. Maybe 3-6 months from now, but they will be lucky to average 200 tops a day at anytime prior to 1 November. Right now, to be best of our knowledge they are averaging 0 tops per day.
 

AZ_Liberty

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So one a recent live stream it was suggested that 700 tops a day was a possibility... I nearly died laughing because these clowns haven't been able to produce even 100 tops a day of acceptable quality.
To meet the actual backlog, they need to be able to do around 800/day.

I'm not holding my breath either. It will be dozens, ramping to a couple hundred if we are lucky. They are going to need to run parallel with multiple sets of tooling to actually get to FRIP.
 

Gotdesl

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I'm in the exact same situation of the 8/9 build week, then nothing else heard...no window sticker and no notification of being moved to a new week. My dealer has checked the status on their system and it has not changed since that week either. I agree with you in that I'm also hoping it is not built yet because if it is then it would be at DM until October and the MIC 2.0s are ready (hopefully). If it isn't built then only thing that makes sense to me is that they fit the 8/9 week FE builds into possible open slots in Sep/Oct. The question is if they will ever tell us that...?
I'm in the same boat, but with a 2 door Badlands. After hearing absolutely nothing since 8/9 week came and went, I got a new build week of 9/20 sometime within the past 48 hours. That said, I'll believe it when I see it as it goes against everything Ford has outlined to happen. It also doesn't make sense for Ford to continue to currently schedule known bad dates so I'm not sure what to make of it. I'm weary of the false build date merry-go-round. Hoping for the best, but expecting more of the same...
 

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What’s the delivery window once in production?
 

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So one a recent live stream it was suggested that 700 tops a day was a possibility... I nearly died laughing because these clowns haven't been able to produce even 100 tops a day of acceptable quality. They are suggesting that they can do 7 times that?!?!? If that was the case, the backlog would be cleared out in 21 to 24 days. There is no way in hell that they are going to build 700 acceptable tops per day.... not in the next 2 months. Maybe 3-6 months from now, but they will be lucky to average 200 tops a day at anytime prior to 1 November. Right now, to be best of our knowledge they are averaging 0 tops per day.
I don't know about those numbers, but they were matching demand and the plan was to go "full speed" as of the beginning of August, which indicates that they were ready to go with as many as were necessary. The problem seems to have been with the design than the production capacity.
 

Spray

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Just my thoughts on the MIC top fiasco, I have not had the opportunity to see any of the preproduction units with the MIC tops. Perhaps someone who has can chime in and let us all know if these problems were seen prior to volume production. I would guess these preproduction tops were made by Ford in a prototype facility using a defined process, tooling and material. If none of these tops showed any of the raw edges or honeycomb issues it would seem that ford had a proven process with the correct amount of material defined to manufacture an acceptable MIC top. Once out of the control of the prototype phase you get other groups involved (Manufacturing Engineering) to fine tune the design (Cost reduction) for production. This is most likely where things went south. The materials initially used may have been changed, the quantity of material reduced, tooling may have been changed, the manufacturing processes may have changed, or a combination of all of these things plus outsourcing the production to a subcontractor could easily create the issue we all now face with the MIC tops.
If the preproduction MIC tops were able to be produced correctly then ford does have the correct solution to this problem in hand and would only need to release it to production and possibly replicate tooling as needed for production volumes required to meet demand forecasts.
At the same time we have no idea as to how many tops Webasto can produce per day or what their rejection rate is on the molded parts out of the mold.
If anyone knows any of the background regarding how we got from what seemed like a good MIC top in preproduction to the mess we have now I would love to hear it!

Just my two cents.
BTW, I only spent 25 years in product development.
 

borrek

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Just my thoughts on the MIC top fiasco, I have not had the opportunity to see any of the preproduction units with the MIC tops. Perhaps someone who has can chime in and let us all know if these problems were seen prior to volume production. I would guess these preproduction tops were made by Ford in a prototype facility using a defined process, tooling and material. If none of these tops showed any of the raw edges or honeycomb issues it would seem that ford had a proven process with the correct amount of material defined to manufacture an acceptable MIC top. Once out of the control of the prototype phase you get other groups involved (Manufacturing Engineering) to fine tune the design (Cost reduction) for production. This is most likely where things went south. The materials initially used may have been changed, the quantity of material reduced, tooling may have been changed, the manufacturing processes may have changed, or a combination of all of these things plus outsourcing the production to a subcontractor could easily create the issue we all now face with the MIC tops.
If the preproduction MIC tops were able to be produced correctly then ford does have the correct solution to this problem in hand and would only need to release it to production and possibly replicate tooling as needed for production volumes required to meet demand forecasts.
At the same time we have no idea as to how many tops Webasto can produce per day or what their rejection rate is on the molded parts out of the mold.
If anyone knows any of the background regarding how we got from what seemed like a good MIC top in preproduction to the mess we have now I would love to hear it!

Just my two cents.
BTW, I only spent 25 years in product development.
I'm going to be "that guy" and give some info with absolutely no supporting evidence to say that clearly you've done product development because you are spot on. We're close family friends with someone who was on the design team for the MIC top at Webasto. They used a small prototyping process and did a great job and everyone thought it was a great success, then at the last minute before production ramped up management said "we've got it from here boys" and took all ownership away from the engineers who designed and built the early units. Production was changed. Tweaks were made based on tooling. The end product wasn't anything some of the designers even wanted their name on.

It was enough that our friend left Webasto because of this.
 

U725Bronco

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I'm going to be "that guy" and give some info with absolutely no supporting evidence to say that clearly you've done product development because you are spot on. We're close family friends with someone who was on the design team for the MIC top at Webasto. They used a small prototyping process and did a great job and everyone thought it was a great success, then at the last minute before production ramped up management said "we've got it from here boys" and took all ownership away from the engineers who designed and built the early units. Production was changed. Tweaks were made based on tooling. The end product wasn't anything some of the designers even wanted their name on.

It was enough that our friend left Webasto because of this.
Good intel....what do you know about MIC 2.0?
 

balucipher

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I'm going to be "that guy" and give some info with absolutely no supporting evidence to say that clearly you've done product development because you are spot on. We're close family friends with someone who was on the design team for the MIC top at Webasto. They used a small prototyping process and did a great job and everyone thought it was a great success, then at the last minute before production ramped up management said "we've got it from here boys" and took all ownership away from the engineers who designed and built the early units. Production was changed. Tweaks were made based on tooling. The end product wasn't anything some of the designers even wanted their name on.

It was enough that our friend left Webasto because of this.
damn
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