New article with a spin on the hardtop I hadn't heard

[iamchewby]

As the consumer, I would be happy to pay more to have ze Germans build the top.

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[Paul Gagnon]

Henry is turning over in his grave. There was a time when Ford created everything for a car except the rubber for the tires. They even tried that but it didn’t work out. They who live buy the outsource, die by the outsource.

Actually at one point Ford owned it's own rubber plantation.

 

[usarms]

According to the components sticker I read on the window of one this morning only 12% (engine) of the Big Bend that was there was made in Mexico. The balance was USA and Canada,

 

[usarms]

Actually at one point Ford owned it's own rubber plantation.

And old Henry lost his ass on that one.

 

[Bob 07064]

Classic folley in Automotive Manufacturing. Get China tooling with China prices, then you get China-level service when it all goes wrong, and rely on people on the other side of the planet to rapidly respond to issues.

Ugh, just another story in the industry. Can't wait to reshore our suppliers.

You still believe in that fantasy? The American consumer and business want things to be cheap. to expensive to produce anything here. Wages and benefits eats up profit...

 

[Paul Gagnon]

honestly I'm not really surprised. They knew over 18 months ago that they didnt have what was necessary to meet their standards and continued anyways, now we are where we are. SURELY this had to have been known as an inevitable crisis but they continued anyways.

Not that Ford hasn't screwed this up royally but to give them the benefit of the doubt, they were probably only expecting to sell a piddly amount of Broncos, like along the lines of Mustang volume. If they were only expecting to sell ~40,000 Broncos a year it stands to reason that they would have been completely unprepared for the response to the Bronco.

 

[PowPow]

I certainly never heard about the Wuhan connection. Good grief, what a debacle!

The first hardtop is probably what brought covid to the US!

It's literally all Ford's fault.

 

[DieselSmack]

You still believe in that fantasy? The American consumer and business want things to be cheap. to expensive to produce anything here. Wages and benefits eats up profit...

That's not inherently true across the board. Many of my customers have brought tooling back to NA for new product launches, including one of my tooling divisions, has been hammering out new steel for OEMs in record numbers. This goes for many automotive manufacturers. China steel isn't as cheap as it once was, and the value proposition for going overseas is diminishing with increased logistics and manufacturing costs...

Things take a long-time to reach the consumer but in the supply chain there are many changes happening. So yes, I do "still believe in this fantasy" because I'm watching this trend pick-up speed right before my eyes. Hard to agree with you on that front.

 

[palley6]

Not that Ford hasn't screwed this up royally but to give them the benefit of the doubt, they were probably only expecting to sell a piddly amount of Broncos, like along the lines of Mustang volume. If they were only expecting to sell ~40,000 Broncos a year it stands to reason that they would have been completely unprepared for the response to the Bronco.

ok fair play, I guess the reservations werent until July. Still leaves almost an entire year though that they could have focused on this, but I have to believe FoMoCo did what was necessary.

 

[PowPow]

As the consumer, I would be happy to pay more to have ze Germans build the top.

is this sarcasm? I can't tell...

Webasto IS a German company...

 

[indio22]

More "COVID ate my homework".

 

[Bob 07064]

That's not inherently true across the board. Many of my customers have brought tooling back to NA for new product launches, including one of my tooling divisions, has been hammering out new steel for OEMs in record numbers. This goes for many automotive manufacturers. China steel isn't as cheap as it once was, and the value proposition for going overseas is diminishing with increased logistics and manufacturing costs...

Things take a long-time to reach the consumer but in the supply chain there are many changes happening. So yes, I do "still believe in this fantasy" because I'm watching this trend pick-up speed right before my eyes. Hard to agree with you on that front.

Not within our generation.... But a caveat to the whole covid thing is that undervalued jobs such as food service and the like have finally found footing to demand and get better wages. And no I'm not in that class... I work in specialty manufacturing...

 

[Paul Gagnon]

That's not inherently true across the board. Many of my customers have brought tooling back to NA for new product launches, including one of my tooling divisions, has been hammering out new steel for OEMs in record numbers. This goes for many automotive manufacturers. China steel isn't as cheap as it once was, and the value proposition for going overseas is diminishing with increased logistics and manufacturing costs...

Things take a long-time to reach the consumer but in the supply chain there are many changes happening. So yes, I do "still believe in this fantasy" because I'm watching this trend pick-up speed right before my eyes. Hard to agree with you on that front.

Back when I worked in a fishing lure factory we had some Canadian made stamping and punching dies that were 50 or 60 years old and still going strong with perfect alignment and easy maintenance. We had 10 year old Taiwanese dies that were almost completely worn out, difficult to maintain, poorly hardened and sticky. Nobody local would fix them so we had to be extra careful when using them and there wasn't enough extra material to make a proper corrective repair . I think the biggest issue with having tooling made overseas is that once you receive it, you're on your own. You're not going to ship tooling back to China or Taiwan or wherever, you're going to be stuck with living with the problem.

 

[DieselSmack]

Not within our generation.... But a caveat to the whole covid thing is that undervalued jobs such as food service and the like have finally found footing to demand and get better wages. And no I'm not in that class... I work in specialty manufacturing...

As I literally have conversations with OEMs about this and upcoming product launches, I don't think you are seeing the same picture as me. That's fine, I'm just happy that North American firms are winning business that would've never been competitive 5 years ago.

 

[DieselSmack]

Back when I worked in a fishing lure factory we had some Canadian made stamping and punching dies that were 50 or 60 years old and still going strong with perfect alignment and easy maintenance. We had 10 year old Taiwanese dies that were almost completely worn out, difficult to maintain, poorly hardened and sticky. Nobody local would fix them so we had to be extra careful when using them and there wasn't enough extra material to make a proper corrective repair . I think the biggest issue with having tooling made overseas is that once you receive it, you're on your own. You're not going to ship tooling back to China or Taiwan or wherever, you're going to be stuck with living with the problem.

This is very true and a major driver of localization recently. Especially with more advanced processes and materials being used with shorter and shorter leadtimes. Supplier management practices, OEM engineer experience levels, and availability of resources for critical down-time is starting to overtake low-cost production, high-cost service with low accountability.

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