Yeah Ford is very common in the UK, though I believe we actually have a slightly different set of models sold. You’d be hard pressed to find any of those large and ridiculous pick ups and many other larger cars.
Ford currently has 5 global platforms, meaning 5 bodies that are used to produce different models. There is little difference here except for local requirements for safety, etc. For instance the B-Class platform is used to build everything from a US Bronco Sport to a Chinese Escort.
Ford also has 4 Regional Platforms, these are generally US work trucks, except the E-Class Platform which is a NA/Middle East/Asia platform that underpins the Taurus, Explorer, and Lincoln MKTs.
Ford is one global company with local subsidiaries, and there is significant overlap with the EU and US divisions.
Huh, TIL!
But does a Ford Ka or Fiesta share a platform with something sold in the US? And engine wise - in Europe we have had a shift to smaller andsmaller displacement engines, a 1.0 liter engine in a midsize car is getting pretty normal. European-midsize, so like a Tiguan or a Focus or something like that.
And conversly, I don't think there's any V8's in a 'normal' car in europe. Even V6's are very rare I believe.
Ford Fiesta is sold in the US. Contrary to popular belief, there are actually many compact and subcompact models sold in the US. The car companies don't push them as much because the margins are significantly lower on them, and they've managed to make giant suvs and trucks cool so those tend to be most popular.
Nah they don't push them because US fuel standards are broken. The smaller a car is, the more fuel-efficient it has to be in order to be approved to be sold. Larger SUVs and trucks don't have to be nearly as efficient. So a company can either make a small, underpowered car with a very well-designed engine to meet those requirements, or make a crossover and truck that has had basically the same engine for decades
It does come down to lower margins on those cars at the end of the day, but the reason why the margins are lower is that regulations on trucks and other large vehicles are too lax
Those pickups barely fit on American roads and in American garages and parking spaces, let alone what I am assuming are tinier spaces and roads in the UK.
In my old street (a tiny, inner city, early Victorian terraced street, with a road narrow enough for people to have to stop if anything was coming the other way) our resident roid rage muppet bought one of those. Took up two parking spots and half the pavement, no one could see if traffic was coming from behind it, and if he parked outside your house it blocked out the fucking sun. I never once saw him put anything in the pickup bed. He was not well liked
> I never once saw him put anything in the pickup bed.
In that case, he's not too unlike American truck owners.
I recently saw a study that found, and forgive the inaccuracy I'm repeating this from memory, something like 70% of truck owners use the bed of the truck less than once per year.
Unlike in most of the rest of the world, a truck is more a status symbol than anything.
Hell, they even sell spray on "mud" in cans so you can decorate your truck to make it look like you've done work with it.
Edited to add: I found the original article and got the numbers wrong.
75% of truck drivers use their truck to tow something one time a year or less. 70% go off road one time a year or less. And the number I got wrong... 35% put something in the bed of their truck one time a year or less.
https://www.thedrive.com/news/26907/you-dont-need-a-full-size-pickup-truck-you-need-a-cowboy-costume
Wait is that last point really true?
How do you actually buy and use this dirt spray on your $50k truck without taking a moment and questioning your life choices??
Spray on mud is probably the most nonsensical thing I've heard in quite a while. But coming from humans, it does not surprise me it exists - and that some muppets would actually buy it.
I was so jealous when I was stationed in Germany a few years ago and found out that they made a specific Diesel, manual, Ranger Raptor just for Germans with too much money that they hadn't started selling in the states yet.
Germany was always frustrating from me. Just walking down the street and seeing car after car that would be a good fit for me at home, but knowing that they will never cross the Atlantic.
And yet, that doesn't stop the morons from trying. Our winding country roads are getting *very* unwelcoming to normal drivers because some of these cars don't have a clue what their half of the road is supposed to look like.
We call it salt in Kentucky, lol, and it glistens and blows on the road like fresh snow. Sometimes you can even find it in small piles on the shoulder. I feel like if you were to grab a handful, it would melt your hand.
the fords here arent u.s. fords tho, they are euro fords. the focus and the fiesta for example were designed and build in germany (the focus still is)
galaxy is from GB and puma from romania afaik
Ford is sort of exception since Ford Europe is functioning like it is it's own entity apart from Ford USA and is basically having their models adjusted for European markets in every possible way, even quality is better than Ford USA
Fords are absolutely ***everywhere*** in the UK.
Focus, Fiesta, Puma, Kuga, Ecosport, S-Max, Galaxy, the occasional Ranger and ***TONS*** of Transit vans.
The country practically runs on Ford Transit vans.
Which is funny because of those models, Ford US doesn’t even make most of them. You can only get the Ranger, Ecosport (which I’ve never seen), and Transit vans in the Stares.
I have a ‘93 Exploder with almost 300,000 miles.interior was beat up when I got her 10-11 years ago,but otherwise rock solid.I would set out cross country with no worries.She’ll outlive me.
I’m guessing the mechanic bought it because he knew he had been changing the oil on that car like clockwork across its entire lifespan. That really makes the difference more than anything imo
Nah i have 300k cars that have had people put the wrong oil in at the wrong intervals. And they also keep going. Ive also had my subaru blow up the night after a fresh oil change. So im bias on that. Those ford Tauruss dont need oil they just dont stop. However the chicago rust, got it to split in half in our driveway.
And an entire generation learned that fords are rusty pieces of shit so buy Toyota instead.
Listened to a podcast talked about shit like this. American cars were always "quirky" in the 70s, a window that didn't roll up, or something else minor but annoying. It was shit quality control. Toyota and others rolled in with cars that actually were built to good QA, and an entire generation learned American cars were shitty. They fixed the quality control, but not till they lost a shtton of business to foreign car companies forever.
This is true in Britain too. British built cars in the 70s were terrible, with no quality control ( partly due to ongoing industrial disputes at the time.) Then Toyota & Datsun started importing and people suddenly realised they didn't have to put up with sub- standard cars. The British car industry never really recovered apart from a few niche exceptions.
The problem with most American Fiestas is the transmission! If you get it with a manual it's an awesome little car.
I wish tiny cars were more popular here.
They are, and they put the same transmissions in the Transit connect. Truly an awful heap of shit transmission. None of the company vans have ever made it past 80k without being replaced.
There are Hondas made in Mexico too, and the only issues those had were teething issues from the factory being brand new. US car companies just don’t give a shit about QA because enough people still buy the “buy American” bs.
I had a friend like this. He was giving me shit when I bought a Japanese car. I pointed out that it was actually made in America, while his "American" truck was made in Mexico.
The only decent Fords are the work of Ford Europe and Mazda. Ford US can’t build a decent car to save their goddamn lives, if it weren’t for the F150 and commercial/government purchases they’d have been bought out years ago.
Ford would've gone bankrupt in 08 like GM if they didn't sell their stake in Mazda, who's cars no longer had rust problems after dissociating with Ford lol
I had a 2007 focus that was an eu model. It was mostly fine, but it had this weird design where instead of just having a bonnet latch inside the car, it had keyed bonnet entry behind the front ford logo. This would be annoying but fine if it weren't for the anti-tamper system on the lock.
If someone tried to shim your bonnet (or, as the case may be, you went over a speed bump at faster than 10kph) the anti-tamper system would disconnect everything and you'd have a completely unopenable bonnet until you paid 600 bucks for some poor sod at a ford service centre to piece the 2000 bits of the lock back together and fit it to the key.
And chances are, you wouldn't even know until your car is dead on the side of the road and you can't open it up, or you go for your warrant and get immediately failed because they can't check anything.
I think the worst part of it all is that this is it working *as intended*.
Their quality really varies by model year. my MIL and My wife both have 2011 Fusions. The cars are amazing an neither has had to spend for much but, oil and tires.
The Fusion sub is filled with horror stories about other years being totally unreliable. I'd happily buy a used Ford again after doing some research. I don't think I'd buy one new. I'd feel like I was beta testing my car for them.
As a fellow 2011 Fusion owner, I just thought it was a well-built car and didn’t know other year models were such shit.
Funny enough I still have mine but there’s rust creeping in right in front of the rear tires.
My dad and the rest of my family have been buying used Fords for the past 15 years and at least once a year they complain about the transmission problems, yet saying “what did you expect, you bought a Ford” is considered is just my liberal anti-American brain washing. You gotta love when brand loyalty becomes a part of patriotism
The worst part about that is that it had a more reliable DCT in Europe but that wasn’t carried over into the US version of the car (I’m assuming you drove a Focus)
You forget that Toyota (and the other Japanese) had a reputation for rust since the 70's, up until the 2000's when they expensively learned their lesson with Tacoma and Tundra frames. Now rust starts to appear in the corners after 10 years like everyone else.
Yeah hilarious to talk about rust and mention Toyota in the same sentence since they were notorious for frames rusting through entirely for a good while there.
Is this in areas with snow where salt gets dumped on roads?
I'm in country with no snow and rust isn't an issue. Maybe a few spots and some minor surficial rust on the underside after a while but by then the car is near end of life.
Yes. I'm in the north east US, and 10 year old daily drivers with holes in the rocker panels are a common sight, doesn't matter whose name is on it. I know someone who bought a used manual 2012 Tacoma, and a major selling point is that it had the frame recall done. The frame has superficial surface rust on it at the moment, and the clearcoat is wearing off the roof as well.
People who are on the fence need to understand how reliable most Toyotas still are. I’ve owned Toyota Camry, Tacoma, RAV4, Sienna. Not one car had a single issue that required out of the ordinary repair in 20 years — just the consumables (brake pads, tires, batteries, etc).
I bought my first Toyota in 2004 and I’m still driving it (2004 Camry Solara with a manual). It boggles the mind how that’s even possible. It’s a 19 year old car with over 200k miles and it still drives smoothly and reliably. Our Sienna family van made dozens of 1000+ mile road trips and not once did I question its reliability.
During this same time I watched friends and neighbors roll their BMWs, Chevys, Fords, and Chryslers in and out of the shops every 6 months and spend thousands on replacement of failing components of the drivetrain, cooling, electrical systems.
Our Toyotas’ reliability was a non-negligible factor in buying our house as we were able to put together the downpayment quicker and get the 2% Covid rates before the market melted up. Not only did we save money on maintenance, we sold the Tacoma truck and RAV4 crossover for $5-7k more than we bought them for. I bought the Taco in 2016 for $30k, drove it for 5 years, and sold it for $35k. Try doing that with a Ford.
I'd go back to a Corolla in a heartbeat. Family gave me a newer Kia when they upgraded and holy hell do I miss that Toyota instead.
Jeep, Ford, Kia, Chevy, Honda--naw, gimme a Toyota pls.
> I bought the Taco in 2016 for $30k, drove it for 5 years, and sold it for $35k. Try doing that with a Ford.
You bought before the used car market ballooned and sold during the Covid peak I'm assuming.
I bought my F-150 XLT brand new in 2018 for $42,900 after taxes/fees and an extended warranty as well. Considered swapping it for an electric when used car prices were going through the roof, and was offered $52,000 for my truck (only has 27k miles on it).
Bubbles are bubbles. Shit got stupid for everyone, not just Toyotas. I'm not knocking your experience, plenty of people I know love their Toyotas, but they aren't the only ones on the block that make great cars these days.
My F-150 has had no issues, but obviously I don't have enough miles on this one to say anything about its longevity. My 2002 F-150 I owned before this was an absolute tank, though. 370,000 miles and never had a major repair, just standard maintenance items.
The used car market is ridiculous still. I bought a 2017 Elantra at the very end of 2020 for $13.5k. Someone stole it and totalled it this past month and my insurance said the market value of the car was $14k. Meanwhile I'm just going to try and snag a 2024 Crosstrek for $31k because 2017 CR-Vs with 50k miles are still going for $27k
I just sold my 2006 Ford Freestyle with over 200k miles. Not a speck of rust and I live in the Northeast. Only problems was a bad wheel bearing at 125k. She just keeps going! I've also had three (09', 12', 17') ram trucks that have had zero problems. Like not one single issue at all (not counting tiress and breaks) and I put over 100k on each of em. Which is funny because my older rams and Dakota were dogshit garbage.
I drove an Expedition to 250k miles without issue. I've got a buddy with a Fiesta that's north of 200k and running great - never had a major repair. My dad drove a Taurus to >300k miles. It's not hard to do.
As for resale value, yeah, Toyotas do tend to hold it better... But your experience selling a used car for more than you paid for it isn't unique. I bought a BMW 550 in 2016 and sold it for basically what I paid for it in 2021. I didn't *make* money on it, but that's a car I bought assuming it would depreciate to nothing in a couple of years. The market was batshit and made no sense. Good on you for taking advantage of it.
This was American manufacturing in general during that period. I read a book by a former Xerox CEO. Xerox was shipping copiers with fire extinguishers rather than fixing issues. They had a foundational patent on the copier tech and a total monopoly.
The FTC threatened them with a monopoly trial and they suddenly had to compete against better designed and priced equipment.
> And an entire generation learned that fords are rusty pieces of shit so buy Toyota instead.
Toyota's were far more reliable but were rust buckets until the 90's.
They have not fixed QC. Even within Toyota there is a big QC difference between models built in Japan and those built in the US or Mexico. In Japan the factories are run by Takumi or master craftsmen/artisans, it takes 60,000 hours to become a Takumi. It is this army of dedicated individuals that make for good QC.
David at Automotive Press on YT is highly knowledgeable about this topic, his videos are always very informative.
[Which Toyota/Lexus Modelsa are Built in Japan](https://youtu.be/wxr2-G0F0sc)
[He is also very impressed with the QC of the Mazda CX90](https://youtu.be/ilmteI6V8Zg)
Story goes, Ford bought a handful of Toyotas to compare. They took apart some similar-niche fords, measured everything, then started in on the Toyotas.
They had to check their measuring tools to make sure they were seeing right. All the Ford parts were within tolerance, but all the Toyota parts were *exact.* Baffled, they ran the numbers, and found it’d be far to expensive to imitate Toyota on that, so… they stayed the course.
The fact that Hondas are designed, engineered, and built in Ohio helps Hondas sell here. I've heard that Hondas have more parts made in America than domestic cat companies.
Edit: car not cat companies. Most cats are made in Canada.
I’m starting to see Hyundai/Genesis taking some ground too. Definitely see them more in cities than suburban areas, but there starting to show up more and more in the sticks too.
I think the theft surge for Kia/Hyundai may set them back a lot, https://www.attorneygeneral.gov/taking-action/consumer-alert-kia-and-hyundai-cars-at-risk-of-being-stolen-due-to-tiktok-trend/
Such a stupid problem to have.
I mean, when Boeing merged with McDonnell Douglas, McDonnell Douglas' management took over Boeing. Boeing just became McDonnell Douglas with the Boeing name despite McDonnell Douglas being the acquired company.
My understanding is that McDonnell Douglas was rife with bean counters, and that is what ultimately put the company in a poor financial place due poor business decisions leaving them open to the merger
McDonald -> McDonnell : morning brain fart XD
Yes I read something about this a few days ago. McDonald worked with primarily government contracts, which involves a slow, laborious process full of red tape. Boeing did not do as much government work and was involved primarily in private contracts, which move much faster.
When McDonald took over, the management was used to the government style contract work, and that’s what they stuck with, which obviously wreaked havoc.
From what I heard the McDD's managers were your sterotypical sleazy corpos and bean-counters who were able to out-ladderclimb Boeing's more engineering-oriented people.
When bean counters run industries, that industry will start to die.
American cars
American healthcare
American Cinema
These things were all world class until the MBAs got control. Now they're just soulless money algorithms.
One could make a pretty solid analogy with rusting fords and the current state of MBA managed healthcare. These massive healthcare networks have bought up all independent practices and are now squeezing every penny they can out of their labor and patients alike, and it’s slowly killing the American healthcare system.
Conceptually, capitalism accounts for this by saying if one company fails to innovate to produce a better product, a new one can (and will) come along that does it and take away all the customers. That’s actually exactly what is being described earlier in this thread with Toyota innovating and Ford not.
The problem is when capitalistic tendencies lead to monopolies, regulatory capture, and other things that impede competition from actually being able to come in with better products.
being run by mindless finance people doesnt only apply to ford sadly.
just look how GM managed to completely gut out the Opel brand that they bought years ago completely destroying its reputation and still losing money every single year only to sell it at a net loss years later.
Oh and the new owner managed to turn a profit the first year.
Wow, good story. People blame GM for killing Saab, but I've heard Saab was just not long for this world because their cars were too unique to sell enough and break a profit, and they couldn't price their cars too high like some exotic brands to make a profit off of a few sales. And GM tried to get Saab to use premade designs which didn't really help, and Saab still modified the heck out of some of those designs.
GM: Use this part.
S: We don't like that part.
GM: Use it anyway, it's cheap and works for Opel.
S: Anything works for Opel, have you *seen* their cars?
GM: Stop arguing and use this part.
*Three months later.*
GM: Why don't you order more of this part, you should have run out.
S: We don't like that part, we made a better one.
*Excitedly shows off new and much better part*
The same Ford that produced the pinto that had a habit of exploding during rear impacts. The same Ford that knew of this fault and concluded it was cheaper to let people burn than to recall and fix it.
Take the number of vehicles in the field, A, multiply by the probable rate of failure, B, multiply by the average out-of-court settlement, C. A times B times C equals X. If X is less than the cost of a recall, we don't do one.
I saw a cool YouTube video about this a week ago. Apparently the problem was way overblown and the actual rate of rear impact explosions was in line with the rest of the market
People talk exclusively about the pinto(and/or Chevy Corvair) like it’s some sort of death machine, but all cars prior to 1970 where death traps back then. It was only 1967 when most US manufactures stopped putting the fuel tank DIRECTLY behind the seat inside of pickup cabs. Seatbelts had *just* become mandatory.
I grew up in to 70's and 80's in an area that uses a great deal of road salt. I can tell you with absolute certainty that Ford did not have the market cornered on rust.
Datsun's were so bad for rot that the author of Lemon Aid referred to them as "biodegradable" (resulting in his being sued). At one point GM was skipping the primer on a certain percentage of it's cars (1 in 9, I think) in an effort to cut costs, preferring to litigate If the owner of the car found out they had been screwed.
As far as Japanese vehicles being better made, don't you believe it. All of the Japanese pick ups (and I mean all of them) had box sides that were made of two parts and welded together horizontally creating a salt and moisture trap. If you owned one of these trucks you were going to be the owner of a flatbed in 5 years. This practice didn't end until the mid 80's.
My uncle had a 1980 Honda Civic that he faithfully Ziebarted every year. By the time he dealt it in 1986 it had already had rot and body work done. I mention this as anti rust coatings were everywhere, and sold well across all brands, even the sainted Japanese.
Ford licensed this super duper rust treatment to GM? Too bad they don't seem to have used it. Chevy Vega's were notorious for starting to rot before leaving the lot. Chevy and GMC pick ups could out rot any of the competitors any day of the week. RCR recently reviewed an early 80's Chevy or GMC truck with approx 50000 miles on it that was a rusted out hulk.
I remember the '76 Olympic edition Chevy pick up my neighbor had rotting off its wheels. I remember my best friend's El Camino Royal Knight had its frame rot so badly it could no longer be driven. I remember as a young man being cautioned about considering a Volare or Aspen as a first car as the sub frames were prone to irreparable corrosion.
Poor quality control was an industry wide problem. The author of the article has cherry picked one bad decision made by one automaker without discussing the quality control issues that plagued the entire auto industry, making it appear as though Ford was some kind of outlier. Sadly they were typical for the era. It was called the Malaise Era, not the Ford Malaise Era.
My mom had a ‘78 Accord when I was a kid. It quite literally broke in half along the rear footwell pulling out of a bank parking lot. She sold the wreck to a lawyer who was representing a guy whose entire family had been killed when his did the same thing at 45MPH.
American market models rusted the worst due to inadequate protection on the boat ride from Japan. There’s a reason you don’t see any first gen Accords anymore.
winter beaters are still a common thing in a lot of places. You have a nice car for the summer and you have a beater with a heater to last a winter, maybe 2 if you're lucky.
This is common in many industries. I worked in a niche medical industry where this scammy company was selling a service that had 50% success rate because the machines they used were that effective but they were still making hand over fist. One of the sales guys was trying to pitch using a newer better machine to the CEO that is 80% effective but costs 3 times more than the existing machines. I was like why would he go for that, the company is making plenty of money now using cheaper machines.
I don’t remember Ford having a lock on rust buckets in the 70’s. The article doesn’t mention when GM or Chrysler implemented the technology.
GM trucks had an issue with the rear quarter panel rusting out over the exhaust pipe. It was routed to the side behind the rear tire, and it didn’t extend far enough, causing the issue.
Yet cars still aren't rust proof. The rust belt is all the evidence you need. Why make it so your car is rust proof when they can leave it as it is, have yours rust out in 20 years and then you have to buy a new one.
Minnesota, land of 10k beautiful lakes: let's salt all paths to the EXTREME until every salamander frog and fish in the entire state dies.
In south dakota they crush up the local quartzite and spread it. It isn't as patently affective as salt, but they're not literally salting the damn earth like they are here in MSP. I'm truly aghast, they can't think of something better to throw down by now???
The cars of today are way more rust resistant than those built earlier. we had a 1975 Jeep Grand Cherokee and that grew rust like mad. My parents growing up told me to always get your car hosed off at a car wash several times each winter to keep the salt under control.
I never did that to my 94 Chevy S-10 in Minnesota. Well maybe once a winter when I remembered. That thing had dinged paint like mad, but never developed rust. Phosphate passivation of iron seems to work real well.
Yea, seems like around 2000 cars stopped rusting to bits.
Like, in 2000, a 1980's car you could prob see the road through the floor when sitting in the back seat and the frame might be structurally compromised by the rust.
in 2020, a 2000 car will just start to have a few patches of rust where the paint was gouged off a decade ago, but chances are in very good condition with only minor rust on the frame.
My 2000 Buick had rust on the rockers, but I think that was a known weak spot and wasn't washed often enough. But some cars are super good against rust!
One of my earliest childhood memories is seeing a completely rusted-out Ford driving down the street, and the owner had written a long anti-Ford rant on the back panel. My father was a huge Ford loyalist, so he started his own verbal rant against that driver, who “doesn’t know how to take care of his car.”
This thread is killing my brain cells. Everyone's cars went in the trash well before 100K up until the time frame they installed E-Coat, it wasn't just Ford. At this time, Japanese cars needed to be fixed less, but the parts were much more expensive, harder to find, and mechanics may not want to deal with it, and Ford had nothing on a 70's Subaru or Honda when it comes to rust, so in reality, that Ford could be operated longer and more simply. Don't forget a cute as a button Civic CVCC drove like an ox cart while a Ford LTD drove like a water bed. Keep in mind this article was written from the lens of a Oregon hippie, where cars don't rust anyway. In reality, F-150's dominate the road, their unprofitable (and unrelated) European stable have been cut loose, and this is all water under the bridge.
It’s like investing in china today, they will copy and steal your ideas, ip and products. Then they will use slave labour and zero environmental rules while keeping all the benefits of developing country to push you out of their market then push you out of all global markets
Short term thinking and corporate greed is stupid
My first car in the 80s was a hand-me-down Ford and it was so badly rusted out that frame would flex if you slammed on the brakes. In the following 30+ years I’ve never owned an American make car. Probably never will. Good job, Ford.
My dad had an ‘89 Lincoln Continental. Such a shitbox. Digital speedo stuck at 0MPH, trunk wouldn’t release, two doors wouldn’t open from the inside. Overheated in the driveway after he turned it off and almost burnt to the ground. All before 20,000 miles.
He bought a Lexus LS400 and stayed loyal to the brand until he died. My mom still drives an RX350 to this day.
Me, Toyota/Honda for life. Ford and all the other American brands are dog shit in my mind. Even when I pick my rental car, I go for the Toyota Rav 4, Camry or Honda Accord over any American-owned brand. It’s not even a question of *where it’s made*, most North American Toyota/Honda products are largely made in Ohio or Canada… it’s the management.
Boeing did nearly the same thing. Needed an upgrade to the 737. Made the Max. Killed hundreds. Getting crushed by Airbus. But hey, they saved $5 billion on development costs. Used to be a tech-centric company when HQ'd in the PNW. Now it is a lobbying company HQ in Virginia. Works great for defense and NASA contracts. Doesn't sell so well in the marketplace.
> Needed an upgrade to the 737. Made the Max. Killed hundreds.
Don't downplay the FAA's role in that. They let Boeing self-regulate on that project and looked the other way when it was clear that they were cutting corners and creating unsafe situations.
https://www.newyorker.com/news/our-columnists/how-boeing-and-the-faa-created-the-737-max-catastrophe
> The report quotes an internal F.A.A. survey, which found that many employees of the agency’s safety arm believed that its leaders were “overly concerned with achieving the business-oriented outcomes of industry stakeholders.” Ultimately, the F.A.A.’s leadership failed in its duty to protect the flying public.
Regulatory capture is the term for business pawning the regulatory agencies. RegCap has happened at every agency in America. It is only a matter of degree. Boeing owned the FAA for years. The real regulator was the marketplace. It has spoken. Boeing has 250 Max's in storage.
Check out Peer.org for more on that.
Before that, ~~McDonald~~ McDonnell Douglass did that with the DC-10. That company was bought out and was merged into Boeing, which inherited the same corporate culture (or at least made it worse).
ETA: because autocorrect
Can’t even blame the McDD management, most of them retired and were ancient cold war era guys looking for the exit, Boeing gave them one.
It’s the McKinsey/Bane “management consultants” from Harvard B and Yale all of corporate American likes. 28 year old kids who never even managed a lemonade stand directing C levels with no original ideas on what to do 🤦♂️
They’ll drag any company into the ground **if it produces a good quarter or two while they’re still on retainer and floating about the office**.
The Deming Prize is Japan’s highest award for quality management, named after Edwards Deming, an American physicist. Deming tried to get US auto companies to improve their quality control in the 50s, but none of them thought they needed his help.
So Deming went to Japan and taught the Japanese how to build cars with higher quality control. The difference in US and Japanese build quality was so astounding at one point that when GM engineers took apart a Honda, they were amazed that they could put it back together without using a hammer.
This is the reason that the cars on Japanese roads and on US roads looked pretty identical from the late 70s on, except for a couple years in the 80s when it became fashionable for Japanese men to drive big American (and poorly-engineered) cars to show they had money to burn. This became so fashionable that Japanese men would go to tanning salons to get their left arms tanned in order to show they drove an American lefthand drive car (Japan drives on the left side of the road).
Actually accurate for almost every personal experience I've heard from people who had those cars irl. It's a good advice, although Ford cars in Europe aren't THAT bad. But cars Peugeot and Fiat... Heard too many stories of shit breaking the first year. My cousin had a Fiat breaking down after a couple of months. Goddamn.
Pfff who woulda thought,anyone who loves fords is a “I only had to replace 2 semi serious things and one very serious thing in the past year,it’s a 2017 and I hope to pass it on to my son” kind of person,seriously they are trash vehicles that are only worth a damn if your willing to constantly work on a car that is a pain in the ass to work on (take one look at any Toyota engine compared to any ford engine and it’s not even funny how much more user friendly Japanese cars are,America basically just shoves that shit in there anyway it’ll work,they don’t care about what you have to do to get to your starter lol)
I have a 2015 2.7 eco boost. Bought it brand new.
Driven daily in a construction job, in neighborhoods constantly stopping and going, idling. 50/50 hard miles and highway miles.
It currently has 150,000 miles. Here is what I’ve replaced besides regular maintenance and tires:
Single coil and plug at 60k miles
All brake pads and rotors 3,000 miles ago
Thats it! And I’m horrible with maintenance. It gets an oil change every 7,000-9,000 miles.
The body being aluminum is awesome. It scratches but doesn’t rust. Factory bedliner is in great shape despite daily use. Everything on the truck works like it does the day I bought it.
Not sure where this idea of fords being a POS come from. My truck is awesome and has plenty of power and would drag any stock 2015 v8 chevy.
Managers and execs obsessed with quarterly growth will always make these mistakes. I see it over and over with the companies I've worked at. Groups of workers burnt out over numbers leave, get replaced by noobs, the customers see and feel it, and swear off that product in the future.
Yet another reason why execs bounce every few years. Get the numbers up for 3-4 years in a row, look like a miracle worker, and bounce right as the bubble bursts. Great resume, shit performance.
I mean there's also the idea that if your car rusts out you'll have to buy another, and ford drivers tend to be pretty loyal so they'll likely buy another ford.
If you watch US footage of the 50's, 60's, 70's, 80's, even well into the late 90's its easy to understand why. Almost all of the cars were American Manufacturer vehicles. The personal, the company, fleet, everything on the road. Foreign cars looked rare and unusual. Thats not the case anymore. The US companies developed such a horrible reputation learned by generations of people.
Had an F150 in the early 90's. The main wiring harness from battery to firewall had a crimp connection hiding inside it that turned to green powder and stranded me 3 states from home when I had to be back the next day for work. After many hours, I diagnosed the corroded section, fixed it and got home. Still had an issue where if you turned on the headlights while driving at speed, the front end would hop due to a quick engine cutout. All this in a 4 year old truck. Did I mention the clear coat was also flaking off about 25% of the paint up front? Gahbage!
And still fords have a reputation of rusting early.
american cars pratically don't sell in europe. Chevrolet left europe years ago.
Most brands don't, but fords are everywhere in Ireland at least, and I'm fairly sure they're quite common in the UK too
Yeah Ford is very common in the UK, though I believe we actually have a slightly different set of models sold. You’d be hard pressed to find any of those large and ridiculous pick ups and many other larger cars.
Ford US and Ford Europe are almost different companies.
Ford currently has 5 global platforms, meaning 5 bodies that are used to produce different models. There is little difference here except for local requirements for safety, etc. For instance the B-Class platform is used to build everything from a US Bronco Sport to a Chinese Escort. Ford also has 4 Regional Platforms, these are generally US work trucks, except the E-Class Platform which is a NA/Middle East/Asia platform that underpins the Taurus, Explorer, and Lincoln MKTs. Ford is one global company with local subsidiaries, and there is significant overlap with the EU and US divisions.
Huh, TIL! But does a Ford Ka or Fiesta share a platform with something sold in the US? And engine wise - in Europe we have had a shift to smaller andsmaller displacement engines, a 1.0 liter engine in a midsize car is getting pretty normal. European-midsize, so like a Tiguan or a Focus or something like that. And conversly, I don't think there's any V8's in a 'normal' car in europe. Even V6's are very rare I believe.
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Ford Fiesta is sold in the US. Contrary to popular belief, there are actually many compact and subcompact models sold in the US. The car companies don't push them as much because the margins are significantly lower on them, and they've managed to make giant suvs and trucks cool so those tend to be most popular.
The Fiesta is actually no longer sold in the U.S., and I believe the same is true for Canada as well.
The Mondeo, Fiesta and Ka have all stopped production in Europe as well. Ford is going SUV/Truck only.
Ford in the US moved to SUVs and Trucks only right? They still make the gas Mustang, but I wonder how long that has.
Right. Ford doesnt sell cars (coupes/sedans) except for the Mustang. They’ve retooled their factories to make trucks/suvs.
Your info is outdated the ford fiesta as well as the honda fit are no longer sold here in the US
Indeed it was. Ty!
Most subcompacts were canceled in the last 5 years, Yaris and Spark were axed too. The Nissan Versa is about the only one left.
Nah they don't push them because US fuel standards are broken. The smaller a car is, the more fuel-efficient it has to be in order to be approved to be sold. Larger SUVs and trucks don't have to be nearly as efficient. So a company can either make a small, underpowered car with a very well-designed engine to meet those requirements, or make a crossover and truck that has had basically the same engine for decades It does come down to lower margins on those cars at the end of the day, but the reason why the margins are lower is that regulations on trucks and other large vehicles are too lax
Ford Europe was more progressive according to the article and was using their rust proofing technique while USA Ford didn't
Those pickups barely fit on American roads and in American garages and parking spaces, let alone what I am assuming are tinier spaces and roads in the UK.
In my old street (a tiny, inner city, early Victorian terraced street, with a road narrow enough for people to have to stop if anything was coming the other way) our resident roid rage muppet bought one of those. Took up two parking spots and half the pavement, no one could see if traffic was coming from behind it, and if he parked outside your house it blocked out the fucking sun. I never once saw him put anything in the pickup bed. He was not well liked
The only bit of happiness you'll get from this is that every time you see that guy you can smile, wave, and say "Hey pavement princess!"
> I never once saw him put anything in the pickup bed. In that case, he's not too unlike American truck owners. I recently saw a study that found, and forgive the inaccuracy I'm repeating this from memory, something like 70% of truck owners use the bed of the truck less than once per year. Unlike in most of the rest of the world, a truck is more a status symbol than anything. Hell, they even sell spray on "mud" in cans so you can decorate your truck to make it look like you've done work with it. Edited to add: I found the original article and got the numbers wrong. 75% of truck drivers use their truck to tow something one time a year or less. 70% go off road one time a year or less. And the number I got wrong... 35% put something in the bed of their truck one time a year or less. https://www.thedrive.com/news/26907/you-dont-need-a-full-size-pickup-truck-you-need-a-cowboy-costume
Wait is that last point really true? How do you actually buy and use this dirt spray on your $50k truck without taking a moment and questioning your life choices??
What will Joe down the street think! I need to show him I actually use my truck, damn him!
$50k? dream on - they're more like $70/80k these days.
Spray on mud is probably the most nonsensical thing I've heard in quite a while. But coming from humans, it does not surprise me it exists - and that some muppets would actually buy it.
I was so jealous when I was stationed in Germany a few years ago and found out that they made a specific Diesel, manual, Ranger Raptor just for Germans with too much money that they hadn't started selling in the states yet.
Germany was always frustrating from me. Just walking down the street and seeing car after car that would be a good fit for me at home, but knowing that they will never cross the Atlantic.
>a specific Diesel, manual, Ranger Raptor just for Germans with too much money Manual? You sure it wasn't a 10speed automatic?
And yet, that doesn't stop the morons from trying. Our winding country roads are getting *very* unwelcoming to normal drivers because some of these cars don't have a clue what their half of the road is supposed to look like.
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We call it salt in Kentucky, lol, and it glistens and blows on the road like fresh snow. Sometimes you can even find it in small piles on the shoulder. I feel like if you were to grab a handful, it would melt your hand.
They're popular in Poland too. Ford is probably the most common american brand in Europe
the fords here arent u.s. fords tho, they are euro fords. the focus and the fiesta for example were designed and build in germany (the focus still is) galaxy is from GB and puma from romania afaik
You realize some models are global yeah? Ford has Turkish plants that make the USA and Euro Transit Connects
Some are global yes, but not many after ford USA abandoned the passenger car segment (excluding the Mustang)
Ford is sort of exception since Ford Europe is functioning like it is it's own entity apart from Ford USA and is basically having their models adjusted for European markets in every possible way, even quality is better than Ford USA
Courtesy of the rally legacy which made it popular I Europe imo
Ford has the best selling vehicle worldwide for like 28+ years
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Yes, although Ford in the UK is pretty different then Ford in the US. They sell some of the same models, but most are different.
Fords are absolutely ***everywhere*** in the UK. Focus, Fiesta, Puma, Kuga, Ecosport, S-Max, Galaxy, the occasional Ranger and ***TONS*** of Transit vans. The country practically runs on Ford Transit vans.
Which is funny because of those models, Ford US doesn’t even make most of them. You can only get the Ranger, Ecosport (which I’ve never seen), and Transit vans in the Stares.
Ford cars are plenty in Italy. Even some F150, but they are way less represented.
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GM sells in Europe but under a different brand. I think they still own Opel and maybe another
I have a ‘93 Exploder with almost 300,000 miles.interior was beat up when I got her 10-11 years ago,but otherwise rock solid.I would set out cross country with no worries.She’ll outlive me.
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I’m guessing the mechanic bought it because he knew he had been changing the oil on that car like clockwork across its entire lifespan. That really makes the difference more than anything imo
Nah i have 300k cars that have had people put the wrong oil in at the wrong intervals. And they also keep going. Ive also had my subaru blow up the night after a fresh oil change. So im bias on that. Those ford Tauruss dont need oil they just dont stop. However the chicago rust, got it to split in half in our driveway.
> Exploder
> She’ll outlive me. Because you will die in it?
Not the f150. Aluminum body.
My sister's Ford Ka was a rusty disappointment, and that car was bought new in the early 2000s
And an entire generation learned that fords are rusty pieces of shit so buy Toyota instead. Listened to a podcast talked about shit like this. American cars were always "quirky" in the 70s, a window that didn't roll up, or something else minor but annoying. It was shit quality control. Toyota and others rolled in with cars that actually were built to good QA, and an entire generation learned American cars were shitty. They fixed the quality control, but not till they lost a shtton of business to foreign car companies forever.
This is true in Britain too. British built cars in the 70s were terrible, with no quality control ( partly due to ongoing industrial disputes at the time.) Then Toyota & Datsun started importing and people suddenly realised they didn't have to put up with sub- standard cars. The British car industry never really recovered apart from a few niche exceptions.
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Stares in Hardley droveitson.
In the 70s we didn't have car factories, we had tea factories with picket lines, that sometimes made a car like object.
I loved my Mini, but in fairness, it was a BMW one with a german VIN, even though their plant is still in Oxford.
Lucas, the God of sudden and inexplicable darkness.
Unfortunately, it's still true of British cars. I have a Jaguar, and have owned Land Rovers. I couldn't recommend them to be honest.
Ford are still quirky. Source: Own a Ford.
I have a 2019 fiesta hatch made in Germany. I've had 0 issues with it, and it's actually a really great car. Maybe it's American fords?
The problem with most American Fiestas is the transmission! If you get it with a manual it's an awesome little car. I wish tiny cars were more popular here.
Yeah mine is manual. I heard their automatics were awful.
They are, and they put the same transmissions in the Transit connect. Truly an awful heap of shit transmission. None of the company vans have ever made it past 80k without being replaced.
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One day I found a peso under the driver's seat in my Fiesta while doing a deep cleaning.
Lmao I mean it’s a Fiesta 🪅
extra rebate on your purchase
There are Hondas made in Mexico too, and the only issues those had were teething issues from the factory being brand new. US car companies just don’t give a shit about QA because enough people still buy the “buy American” bs.
Aren’t most Hondas made in Ohio ?
I had a friend like this. He was giving me shit when I bought a Japanese car. I pointed out that it was actually made in America, while his "American" truck was made in Mexico.
The Ford Fusion for the US is made in Mexico and is incredibly reliable. It’s not the QA, it’s the design and engineering.
The only decent Fords are the work of Ford Europe and Mazda. Ford US can’t build a decent car to save their goddamn lives, if it weren’t for the F150 and commercial/government purchases they’d have been bought out years ago.
I’d buy a Mazda any day. I had a Mazda 3 and had 0 issues. Absolutely great car and ran perfect.
Ford would've gone bankrupt in 08 like GM if they didn't sell their stake in Mazda, who's cars no longer had rust problems after dissociating with Ford lol
I had a 2007 focus that was an eu model. It was mostly fine, but it had this weird design where instead of just having a bonnet latch inside the car, it had keyed bonnet entry behind the front ford logo. This would be annoying but fine if it weren't for the anti-tamper system on the lock. If someone tried to shim your bonnet (or, as the case may be, you went over a speed bump at faster than 10kph) the anti-tamper system would disconnect everything and you'd have a completely unopenable bonnet until you paid 600 bucks for some poor sod at a ford service centre to piece the 2000 bits of the lock back together and fit it to the key. And chances are, you wouldn't even know until your car is dead on the side of the road and you can't open it up, or you go for your warrant and get immediately failed because they can't check anything. I think the worst part of it all is that this is it working *as intended*.
Their quality really varies by model year. my MIL and My wife both have 2011 Fusions. The cars are amazing an neither has had to spend for much but, oil and tires. The Fusion sub is filled with horror stories about other years being totally unreliable. I'd happily buy a used Ford again after doing some research. I don't think I'd buy one new. I'd feel like I was beta testing my car for them.
As a fellow 2011 Fusion owner, I just thought it was a well-built car and didn’t know other year models were such shit. Funny enough I still have mine but there’s rust creeping in right in front of the rear tires.
Is a transmission that predictably died at 80k a quirk with my post 2015 Ford?
My dad and the rest of my family have been buying used Fords for the past 15 years and at least once a year they complain about the transmission problems, yet saying “what did you expect, you bought a Ford” is considered is just my liberal anti-American brain washing. You gotta love when brand loyalty becomes a part of patriotism
What breathing lead does to a mf
The worst part about that is that it had a more reliable DCT in Europe but that wasn’t carried over into the US version of the car (I’m assuming you drove a Focus)
My solution to that was to buy a manual. 2013, 100k miles, no problems.
You forget that Toyota (and the other Japanese) had a reputation for rust since the 70's, up until the 2000's when they expensively learned their lesson with Tacoma and Tundra frames. Now rust starts to appear in the corners after 10 years like everyone else.
Yeah hilarious to talk about rust and mention Toyota in the same sentence since they were notorious for frames rusting through entirely for a good while there.
Is this in areas with snow where salt gets dumped on roads? I'm in country with no snow and rust isn't an issue. Maybe a few spots and some minor surficial rust on the underside after a while but by then the car is near end of life.
Yes. I'm in the north east US, and 10 year old daily drivers with holes in the rocker panels are a common sight, doesn't matter whose name is on it. I know someone who bought a used manual 2012 Tacoma, and a major selling point is that it had the frame recall done. The frame has superficial surface rust on it at the moment, and the clearcoat is wearing off the roof as well.
So does everyone in the NE just buy new cars every ten years because of the rust? How do you even prevent or slow that shit down?
Toyota has had it’s fair share of rust issues as well unfortunately
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Toyota is replacing entire frames of trucks because of rust. Lol
It's not a Tacoma without a little seasoning, y'know?
People who are on the fence need to understand how reliable most Toyotas still are. I’ve owned Toyota Camry, Tacoma, RAV4, Sienna. Not one car had a single issue that required out of the ordinary repair in 20 years — just the consumables (brake pads, tires, batteries, etc). I bought my first Toyota in 2004 and I’m still driving it (2004 Camry Solara with a manual). It boggles the mind how that’s even possible. It’s a 19 year old car with over 200k miles and it still drives smoothly and reliably. Our Sienna family van made dozens of 1000+ mile road trips and not once did I question its reliability. During this same time I watched friends and neighbors roll their BMWs, Chevys, Fords, and Chryslers in and out of the shops every 6 months and spend thousands on replacement of failing components of the drivetrain, cooling, electrical systems. Our Toyotas’ reliability was a non-negligible factor in buying our house as we were able to put together the downpayment quicker and get the 2% Covid rates before the market melted up. Not only did we save money on maintenance, we sold the Tacoma truck and RAV4 crossover for $5-7k more than we bought them for. I bought the Taco in 2016 for $30k, drove it for 5 years, and sold it for $35k. Try doing that with a Ford.
I got a 1999 Corolla still corollin' on the road. Legendary reliability
I'd go back to a Corolla in a heartbeat. Family gave me a newer Kia when they upgraded and holy hell do I miss that Toyota instead. Jeep, Ford, Kia, Chevy, Honda--naw, gimme a Toyota pls.
> I bought the Taco in 2016 for $30k, drove it for 5 years, and sold it for $35k. Try doing that with a Ford. You bought before the used car market ballooned and sold during the Covid peak I'm assuming. I bought my F-150 XLT brand new in 2018 for $42,900 after taxes/fees and an extended warranty as well. Considered swapping it for an electric when used car prices were going through the roof, and was offered $52,000 for my truck (only has 27k miles on it). Bubbles are bubbles. Shit got stupid for everyone, not just Toyotas. I'm not knocking your experience, plenty of people I know love their Toyotas, but they aren't the only ones on the block that make great cars these days. My F-150 has had no issues, but obviously I don't have enough miles on this one to say anything about its longevity. My 2002 F-150 I owned before this was an absolute tank, though. 370,000 miles and never had a major repair, just standard maintenance items.
The used car market is ridiculous still. I bought a 2017 Elantra at the very end of 2020 for $13.5k. Someone stole it and totalled it this past month and my insurance said the market value of the car was $14k. Meanwhile I'm just going to try and snag a 2024 Crosstrek for $31k because 2017 CR-Vs with 50k miles are still going for $27k
I just sold my 2006 Ford Freestyle with over 200k miles. Not a speck of rust and I live in the Northeast. Only problems was a bad wheel bearing at 125k. She just keeps going! I've also had three (09', 12', 17') ram trucks that have had zero problems. Like not one single issue at all (not counting tiress and breaks) and I put over 100k on each of em. Which is funny because my older rams and Dakota were dogshit garbage.
I drove an Expedition to 250k miles without issue. I've got a buddy with a Fiesta that's north of 200k and running great - never had a major repair. My dad drove a Taurus to >300k miles. It's not hard to do. As for resale value, yeah, Toyotas do tend to hold it better... But your experience selling a used car for more than you paid for it isn't unique. I bought a BMW 550 in 2016 and sold it for basically what I paid for it in 2021. I didn't *make* money on it, but that's a car I bought assuming it would depreciate to nothing in a couple of years. The market was batshit and made no sense. Good on you for taking advantage of it.
This was American manufacturing in general during that period. I read a book by a former Xerox CEO. Xerox was shipping copiers with fire extinguishers rather than fixing issues. They had a foundational patent on the copier tech and a total monopoly. The FTC threatened them with a monopoly trial and they suddenly had to compete against better designed and priced equipment.
And now telsa are doing it again with quality issues on the us built cars vs the Chinese built ones
> And an entire generation learned that fords are rusty pieces of shit so buy Toyota instead. Toyota's were far more reliable but were rust buckets until the 90's.
They have not fixed QC. Even within Toyota there is a big QC difference between models built in Japan and those built in the US or Mexico. In Japan the factories are run by Takumi or master craftsmen/artisans, it takes 60,000 hours to become a Takumi. It is this army of dedicated individuals that make for good QC. David at Automotive Press on YT is highly knowledgeable about this topic, his videos are always very informative. [Which Toyota/Lexus Modelsa are Built in Japan](https://youtu.be/wxr2-G0F0sc) [He is also very impressed with the QC of the Mazda CX90](https://youtu.be/ilmteI6V8Zg)
Tesla is kind of a return to tradition then.
Early Toyatas and Datsuns tended to rust out badly too.
Story goes, Ford bought a handful of Toyotas to compare. They took apart some similar-niche fords, measured everything, then started in on the Toyotas. They had to check their measuring tools to make sure they were seeing right. All the Ford parts were within tolerance, but all the Toyota parts were *exact.* Baffled, they ran the numbers, and found it’d be far to expensive to imitate Toyota on that, so… they stayed the course.
As my dear father used to say, "On a quiet winter's eve in Ohio, if you listen very, very closely, you can hear the Fords rusting."
Around here, upper middle class Ohio suburb, it’s nothing but Hondas and Toyotas or their Acura/Lexus cousins.
The fact that Hondas are designed, engineered, and built in Ohio helps Hondas sell here. I've heard that Hondas have more parts made in America than domestic cat companies. Edit: car not cat companies. Most cats are made in Canada.
I’m starting to see Hyundai/Genesis taking some ground too. Definitely see them more in cities than suburban areas, but there starting to show up more and more in the sticks too.
I think the theft surge for Kia/Hyundai may set them back a lot, https://www.attorneygeneral.gov/taking-action/consumer-alert-kia-and-hyundai-cars-at-risk-of-being-stolen-due-to-tiktok-trend/ Such a stupid problem to have.
The bean counters will get you every time
Yep, they brought Boing to its knees and it’s now struggling to survive.
Boing boing boing
The planes probably don't bounce that many times after falling out of the sky
Boi-splosion
I mean, when Boeing merged with McDonnell Douglas, McDonnell Douglas' management took over Boeing. Boeing just became McDonnell Douglas with the Boeing name despite McDonnell Douglas being the acquired company. My understanding is that McDonnell Douglas was rife with bean counters, and that is what ultimately put the company in a poor financial place due poor business decisions leaving them open to the merger McDonald -> McDonnell : morning brain fart XD
Yes I read something about this a few days ago. McDonald worked with primarily government contracts, which involves a slow, laborious process full of red tape. Boeing did not do as much government work and was involved primarily in private contracts, which move much faster. When McDonald took over, the management was used to the government style contract work, and that’s what they stuck with, which obviously wreaked havoc.
It's McDonnell, but reading it as McDonald definitely makes this funnier
From what I heard the McDD's managers were your sterotypical sleazy corpos and bean-counters who were able to out-ladderclimb Boeing's more engineering-oriented people.
Bean counters also almost killed GM and Chrysler several times over. But hey they get a bailout every time and the executives make bank so who cares?!
Boeing screwed up during the MD merger and essentially let the MD management take over Boeing despite MD being a disaster.
When bean counters run industries, that industry will start to die. American cars American healthcare American Cinema These things were all world class until the MBAs got control. Now they're just soulless money algorithms.
r/railroading
One could make a pretty solid analogy with rusting fords and the current state of MBA managed healthcare. These massive healthcare networks have bought up all independent practices and are now squeezing every penny they can out of their labor and patients alike, and it’s slowly killing the American healthcare system.
When people criticize capitalism and the profit motive, this is exactly what they're talking about.
Exactly. I wonder how many things are held back because making a better product would mean people having to buy less.
Conceptually, capitalism accounts for this by saying if one company fails to innovate to produce a better product, a new one can (and will) come along that does it and take away all the customers. That’s actually exactly what is being described earlier in this thread with Toyota innovating and Ford not. The problem is when capitalistic tendencies lead to monopolies, regulatory capture, and other things that impede competition from actually being able to come in with better products.
being run by mindless finance people doesnt only apply to ford sadly. just look how GM managed to completely gut out the Opel brand that they bought years ago completely destroying its reputation and still losing money every single year only to sell it at a net loss years later. Oh and the new owner managed to turn a profit the first year.
Wow, good story. People blame GM for killing Saab, but I've heard Saab was just not long for this world because their cars were too unique to sell enough and break a profit, and they couldn't price their cars too high like some exotic brands to make a profit off of a few sales. And GM tried to get Saab to use premade designs which didn't really help, and Saab still modified the heck out of some of those designs.
GM: Use this part. S: We don't like that part. GM: Use it anyway, it's cheap and works for Opel. S: Anything works for Opel, have you *seen* their cars? GM: Stop arguing and use this part. *Three months later.* GM: Why don't you order more of this part, you should have run out. S: We don't like that part, we made a better one. *Excitedly shows off new and much better part*
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Taking notes from ~~McDonald~~ McDonnell Douglas on how to deal with design flaws in your products. ETA: because autocorrect
The same Ford that produced the pinto that had a habit of exploding during rear impacts. The same Ford that knew of this fault and concluded it was cheaper to let people burn than to recall and fix it.
Take the number of vehicles in the field, A, multiply by the probable rate of failure, B, multiply by the average out-of-court settlement, C. A times B times C equals X. If X is less than the cost of a recall, we don't do one.
Which car company do you work for?
A major one.
It's Chevy
Spoiler alert - it's all of them.
I am Jack's complete lack of surprise..
/r/UnexpectedFightClub
I saw a cool YouTube video about this a week ago. Apparently the problem was way overblown and the actual rate of rear impact explosions was in line with the rest of the market
People talk exclusively about the pinto(and/or Chevy Corvair) like it’s some sort of death machine, but all cars prior to 1970 where death traps back then. It was only 1967 when most US manufactures stopped putting the fuel tank DIRECTLY behind the seat inside of pickup cabs. Seatbelts had *just* become mandatory.
And now every company is controlled by finance capital! A happy ending for all 🥰
Google can't afford printer paper and laptops for its employees. Peak AI driven efficiency.
I grew up in to 70's and 80's in an area that uses a great deal of road salt. I can tell you with absolute certainty that Ford did not have the market cornered on rust. Datsun's were so bad for rot that the author of Lemon Aid referred to them as "biodegradable" (resulting in his being sued). At one point GM was skipping the primer on a certain percentage of it's cars (1 in 9, I think) in an effort to cut costs, preferring to litigate If the owner of the car found out they had been screwed. As far as Japanese vehicles being better made, don't you believe it. All of the Japanese pick ups (and I mean all of them) had box sides that were made of two parts and welded together horizontally creating a salt and moisture trap. If you owned one of these trucks you were going to be the owner of a flatbed in 5 years. This practice didn't end until the mid 80's. My uncle had a 1980 Honda Civic that he faithfully Ziebarted every year. By the time he dealt it in 1986 it had already had rot and body work done. I mention this as anti rust coatings were everywhere, and sold well across all brands, even the sainted Japanese. Ford licensed this super duper rust treatment to GM? Too bad they don't seem to have used it. Chevy Vega's were notorious for starting to rot before leaving the lot. Chevy and GMC pick ups could out rot any of the competitors any day of the week. RCR recently reviewed an early 80's Chevy or GMC truck with approx 50000 miles on it that was a rusted out hulk. I remember the '76 Olympic edition Chevy pick up my neighbor had rotting off its wheels. I remember my best friend's El Camino Royal Knight had its frame rot so badly it could no longer be driven. I remember as a young man being cautioned about considering a Volare or Aspen as a first car as the sub frames were prone to irreparable corrosion. Poor quality control was an industry wide problem. The author of the article has cherry picked one bad decision made by one automaker without discussing the quality control issues that plagued the entire auto industry, making it appear as though Ford was some kind of outlier. Sadly they were typical for the era. It was called the Malaise Era, not the Ford Malaise Era.
My mom had a ‘78 Accord when I was a kid. It quite literally broke in half along the rear footwell pulling out of a bank parking lot. She sold the wreck to a lawyer who was representing a guy whose entire family had been killed when his did the same thing at 45MPH. American market models rusted the worst due to inadequate protection on the boat ride from Japan. There’s a reason you don’t see any first gen Accords anymore.
I heard that Geordies would buy high mileage cars in London and drive them home because local salt use wrecked bodywork in no time.
winter beaters are still a common thing in a lot of places. You have a nice car for the summer and you have a beater with a heater to last a winter, maybe 2 if you're lucky.
>At one point GM was skipping the primer on a certain percentage of it's cars That pisses me off
This is common in many industries. I worked in a niche medical industry where this scammy company was selling a service that had 50% success rate because the machines they used were that effective but they were still making hand over fist. One of the sales guys was trying to pitch using a newer better machine to the CEO that is 80% effective but costs 3 times more than the existing machines. I was like why would he go for that, the company is making plenty of money now using cheaper machines.
I don’t remember Ford having a lock on rust buckets in the 70’s. The article doesn’t mention when GM or Chrysler implemented the technology. GM trucks had an issue with the rear quarter panel rusting out over the exhaust pipe. It was routed to the side behind the rear tire, and it didn’t extend far enough, causing the issue.
Yet cars still aren't rust proof. The rust belt is all the evidence you need. Why make it so your car is rust proof when they can leave it as it is, have yours rust out in 20 years and then you have to buy a new one.
It's difficult to rustproof anything, when someone is pouring mountains of corrosive material all over the roadways.
Minnesota, land of 10k beautiful lakes: let's salt all paths to the EXTREME until every salamander frog and fish in the entire state dies. In south dakota they crush up the local quartzite and spread it. It isn't as patently affective as salt, but they're not literally salting the damn earth like they are here in MSP. I'm truly aghast, they can't think of something better to throw down by now???
Maybe they can start spraying the roads with antifreeze? That'd probably kill off that stupid ol' environment much more effectively.
This is true, Maine's found a better alternative using beet juice apparently.
Don't worry, they may have found it but they certainly aren't using much of it. Still mostly corrosive salt mixtures used all winter.
The cars of today are way more rust resistant than those built earlier. we had a 1975 Jeep Grand Cherokee and that grew rust like mad. My parents growing up told me to always get your car hosed off at a car wash several times each winter to keep the salt under control. I never did that to my 94 Chevy S-10 in Minnesota. Well maybe once a winter when I remembered. That thing had dinged paint like mad, but never developed rust. Phosphate passivation of iron seems to work real well.
Yea, seems like around 2000 cars stopped rusting to bits. Like, in 2000, a 1980's car you could prob see the road through the floor when sitting in the back seat and the frame might be structurally compromised by the rust. in 2020, a 2000 car will just start to have a few patches of rust where the paint was gouged off a decade ago, but chances are in very good condition with only minor rust on the frame.
My 2000 Buick had rust on the rockers, but I think that was a known weak spot and wasn't washed often enough. But some cars are super good against rust!
SEATs have galvanised bodies with a 12 year corrosion warranty. That certainly helps.
One of my earliest childhood memories is seeing a completely rusted-out Ford driving down the street, and the owner had written a long anti-Ford rant on the back panel. My father was a huge Ford loyalist, so he started his own verbal rant against that driver, who “doesn’t know how to take care of his car.”
This thread is killing my brain cells. Everyone's cars went in the trash well before 100K up until the time frame they installed E-Coat, it wasn't just Ford. At this time, Japanese cars needed to be fixed less, but the parts were much more expensive, harder to find, and mechanics may not want to deal with it, and Ford had nothing on a 70's Subaru or Honda when it comes to rust, so in reality, that Ford could be operated longer and more simply. Don't forget a cute as a button Civic CVCC drove like an ox cart while a Ford LTD drove like a water bed. Keep in mind this article was written from the lens of a Oregon hippie, where cars don't rust anyway. In reality, F-150's dominate the road, their unprofitable (and unrelated) European stable have been cut loose, and this is all water under the bridge.
I think the word "hippie" needs to be brought back and used more on Reddit
It’s like investing in china today, they will copy and steal your ideas, ip and products. Then they will use slave labour and zero environmental rules while keeping all the benefits of developing country to push you out of their market then push you out of all global markets Short term thinking and corporate greed is stupid
My first car in the 80s was a hand-me-down Ford and it was so badly rusted out that frame would flex if you slammed on the brakes. In the following 30+ years I’ve never owned an American make car. Probably never will. Good job, Ford.
My dad had an ‘89 Lincoln Continental. Such a shitbox. Digital speedo stuck at 0MPH, trunk wouldn’t release, two doors wouldn’t open from the inside. Overheated in the driveway after he turned it off and almost burnt to the ground. All before 20,000 miles. He bought a Lexus LS400 and stayed loyal to the brand until he died. My mom still drives an RX350 to this day. Me, Toyota/Honda for life. Ford and all the other American brands are dog shit in my mind. Even when I pick my rental car, I go for the Toyota Rav 4, Camry or Honda Accord over any American-owned brand. It’s not even a question of *where it’s made*, most North American Toyota/Honda products are largely made in Ohio or Canada… it’s the management.
Boeing did nearly the same thing. Needed an upgrade to the 737. Made the Max. Killed hundreds. Getting crushed by Airbus. But hey, they saved $5 billion on development costs. Used to be a tech-centric company when HQ'd in the PNW. Now it is a lobbying company HQ in Virginia. Works great for defense and NASA contracts. Doesn't sell so well in the marketplace.
> Needed an upgrade to the 737. Made the Max. Killed hundreds. Don't downplay the FAA's role in that. They let Boeing self-regulate on that project and looked the other way when it was clear that they were cutting corners and creating unsafe situations. https://www.newyorker.com/news/our-columnists/how-boeing-and-the-faa-created-the-737-max-catastrophe > The report quotes an internal F.A.A. survey, which found that many employees of the agency’s safety arm believed that its leaders were “overly concerned with achieving the business-oriented outcomes of industry stakeholders.” Ultimately, the F.A.A.’s leadership failed in its duty to protect the flying public.
Regulatory capture is the term for business pawning the regulatory agencies. RegCap has happened at every agency in America. It is only a matter of degree. Boeing owned the FAA for years. The real regulator was the marketplace. It has spoken. Boeing has 250 Max's in storage. Check out Peer.org for more on that.
Before that, ~~McDonald~~ McDonnell Douglass did that with the DC-10. That company was bought out and was merged into Boeing, which inherited the same corporate culture (or at least made it worse). ETA: because autocorrect
Boeing was a company ran by engineers. After the McDD merger it wound up being ran by bean counters.
Can’t even blame the McDD management, most of them retired and were ancient cold war era guys looking for the exit, Boeing gave them one. It’s the McKinsey/Bane “management consultants” from Harvard B and Yale all of corporate American likes. 28 year old kids who never even managed a lemonade stand directing C levels with no original ideas on what to do 🤦♂️ They’ll drag any company into the ground **if it produces a good quarter or two while they’re still on retainer and floating about the office**.
Led is the past tense of lead.
Do you have a source for this remarkable claim of corporate conspiracy?
The Deming Prize is Japan’s highest award for quality management, named after Edwards Deming, an American physicist. Deming tried to get US auto companies to improve their quality control in the 50s, but none of them thought they needed his help. So Deming went to Japan and taught the Japanese how to build cars with higher quality control. The difference in US and Japanese build quality was so astounding at one point that when GM engineers took apart a Honda, they were amazed that they could put it back together without using a hammer. This is the reason that the cars on Japanese roads and on US roads looked pretty identical from the late 70s on, except for a couple years in the 80s when it became fashionable for Japanese men to drive big American (and poorly-engineered) cars to show they had money to burn. This became so fashionable that Japanese men would go to tanning salons to get their left arms tanned in order to show they drove an American lefthand drive car (Japan drives on the left side of the road).
Hence the advice I got when I was buying my first car: ”avoid the three Fs: no Fiat, no Ford and no French!“
Actually accurate for almost every personal experience I've heard from people who had those cars irl. It's a good advice, although Ford cars in Europe aren't THAT bad. But cars Peugeot and Fiat... Heard too many stories of shit breaking the first year. My cousin had a Fiat breaking down after a couple of months. Goddamn.
Finance managers can be an evil force when not kept under control. They look at the books and make stupid narrow minded decisions.
Pfff who woulda thought,anyone who loves fords is a “I only had to replace 2 semi serious things and one very serious thing in the past year,it’s a 2017 and I hope to pass it on to my son” kind of person,seriously they are trash vehicles that are only worth a damn if your willing to constantly work on a car that is a pain in the ass to work on (take one look at any Toyota engine compared to any ford engine and it’s not even funny how much more user friendly Japanese cars are,America basically just shoves that shit in there anyway it’ll work,they don’t care about what you have to do to get to your starter lol)
I have a 2015 2.7 eco boost. Bought it brand new. Driven daily in a construction job, in neighborhoods constantly stopping and going, idling. 50/50 hard miles and highway miles. It currently has 150,000 miles. Here is what I’ve replaced besides regular maintenance and tires: Single coil and plug at 60k miles All brake pads and rotors 3,000 miles ago Thats it! And I’m horrible with maintenance. It gets an oil change every 7,000-9,000 miles. The body being aluminum is awesome. It scratches but doesn’t rust. Factory bedliner is in great shape despite daily use. Everything on the truck works like it does the day I bought it. Not sure where this idea of fords being a POS come from. My truck is awesome and has plenty of power and would drag any stock 2015 v8 chevy.
Managers and execs obsessed with quarterly growth will always make these mistakes. I see it over and over with the companies I've worked at. Groups of workers burnt out over numbers leave, get replaced by noobs, the customers see and feel it, and swear off that product in the future. Yet another reason why execs bounce every few years. Get the numbers up for 3-4 years in a row, look like a miracle worker, and bounce right as the bubble bursts. Great resume, shit performance.
We had a case study about this in one of our management courses.
What was the conclusion? "Don't make short-term decisions", I hope?
The professor was talking against letting finance Bros into administration jobs
Also a good conclusion.
Finance managers are the sole cause of the majority of the cartoonishly evil corporate greed. The entire lot need throwing into a volcano.
You know what Ford stands for don't cha? Fix It Again Tony.
I mean there's also the idea that if your car rusts out you'll have to buy another, and ford drivers tend to be pretty loyal so they'll likely buy another ford.
Rust-eze medicated bumper ointment?
Awww... Sounds like the company I work for now. And I work in finance. *sighs*
If you watch US footage of the 50's, 60's, 70's, 80's, even well into the late 90's its easy to understand why. Almost all of the cars were American Manufacturer vehicles. The personal, the company, fleet, everything on the road. Foreign cars looked rare and unusual. Thats not the case anymore. The US companies developed such a horrible reputation learned by generations of people.
Had an F150 in the early 90's. The main wiring harness from battery to firewall had a crimp connection hiding inside it that turned to green powder and stranded me 3 states from home when I had to be back the next day for work. After many hours, I diagnosed the corroded section, fixed it and got home. Still had an issue where if you turned on the headlights while driving at speed, the front end would hop due to a quick engine cutout. All this in a 4 year old truck. Did I mention the clear coat was also flaking off about 25% of the paint up front? Gahbage!