Major Ford announcement

[malazn mafia]

Originally Posted by block58

Back in the days when Ford NA appreciated the Falcon...

http://www.goauto.com.au/mellor/mell...2573F300206152

Either Mullaly has a very short memory or he is a two-faced ****. Once admired him but now have lost all respect for him.

[Fowl Can]

Originally Posted by bundera

Very sad day, been working away on Falcons all day in a daze.

Had to roll this out for the memories of when it all began

And there's this one, which in view of recent events, is now sadly ironic

[Fowl Can]

Originally Posted by tellford

I recently read a post on another Ford forum dated 29/09/2012.
The poster was speaking to a Ford employee. He told him that Ford Aus is basically a research and development facility for RWD and.........amazingly, said that Ford Aus was closing shop in 2016.
Seems that the decision was made last year?

I think it might have been made - or at least given some serious thought - much earlier than that. Why? That for all of its existence, the FG series has remained (and undoubtedly will remain at this late stage) wagonless.

For instance GMH could have been seen to be cautious with the VE; they waited 2yrs before the wagon variant was released, but it was undoubtedly in the tubes, as was the ute.

For mine, the fact that - outwardly at least - that there was never going to be an FG wagon, could have been perceived then that perhaps the writing was going onto the wall soon.

[babyf6]

Originally Posted by TMC

Watching The Project last night and some woman was being interviewed about the situation and she said Ford keep making all these V8 cars when people just want a zippy small car. Well Hello....... Go down to your Ford dealer and ask to drive a Ford V8 luv. They'll say not here luv. Try FPV. She's mixed Ford up with Holden.!!!!!!

Dad saw that last night, he threw something at the TV

[anto]

Originally Posted by 2011G6E

http://news.drive.com.au/drive/motor...104-2c83p.html
Top selling vehicles (of all types) were:
1. Mazda3 - 44,128
2. Toyota HiLux - 40,646
3. Toyota Corolla - 38,799
4. Holden Commodore - 30,532
5. Holden Cruze - 29,161
6. Hyundai i30 - 28,348
7. Toyota Camry - 27,230
8. Nissan Navara - 26,045
9. Toyota Yaris - 18,808
10. Ford Focus - 18,586

Top selling "cars":
1. Mazda3 - 44,128
2. Toyota Corolla - 38,799
3. Holden Commodore - 30,532
4. Holden Cruze - 29,161
5. Hyundai i30 - 28,348
6. Toyota Camry - 27,230
7. Toyota Yaris - 18,808
8. Ford Focus - 18,586
9. Mazda2 - 17,574
10. Volkswagen Golf - 17,289

As for top selling brands, Ford as a maker is way down at number five...not a nice position to be in.

If I "go away" it won't change those figures...Falcons aren't selling. The public has changed, the majority now don't buy purely because of the badge (or the one single make within the brand) and are far more willing to shop around several different makes before deciding, and simply because a particular name has been around for a while doesn't guarantee sales. Trying to keep what has sadly become a niche market (odd to call a "normal" large sedan a "niche" model, but the figures don't lie) is no way to keep in business.

I'm a realist...I am not badge blind and loyal to the death to one particular badge from one particular maker, as many people seem to be. Look at the big picture and ask yourself what Ford was supposed to do with the Falcon...it's not selling in anywhere near sustainable numbers, so are they to just keep on flogging a dead horse and sucking up taxpayer subsidies just to suit a smaller and smaller number of buyers, while bleeding money all over the place?

History and heritage are nice...but the bottom line is what runs a business, not warm and fuzzy feelings.

It's not a niche market if you consider the como sales numbers, a car which pales in comparison to the falcon. No, the falcon was not marketed the way it should ha ve been...not marketed at all in fact.

[Joe5619]

I personally try to buy Australian made products with every purchase I make... I was planning on buying my next new car in 2017 & I so wanted it to be an all new Australian built Falcon. This won't happen now, so I'll proudly walk into a Holden dealer & buy an Australian made car!! Supporting Australian jobs is far greater than an badge at the front.


I will laugh if the dollar drops back now to $0.60 in 2016 & all those cheap & nasty imports go through the room & the local stuff stays pretty much the same..


Bloody Ford, why did you have to take the easy option!!

[dallasv8]

i wonder what will happen to all the prototype and show cars like the EA GT?

[stevz]

Originally Posted by babyf6

Dad saw that last night, he threw something at the TV

I would like to throw something at that woman's head.

She can speak for herself, but I would rather catch public transport than drive some 'zippy' buzz box.

[FERG_51]

Originally Posted by dallasv8

i wonder what will happen to all the prototype and show cars like the EA GT?

Yeah i wonder what happened to all the history stuff from the discovery in Gellong.

[TMC]

I was thinking about this hypothetical question today. If Falcon was selling well, and they wanted to keep producing the I6 past 2016, they would need Euro 5 compliance. At the moment the EcoLPi has Euro 6 capabilities. My thoughts are that they would have made the I6 direct injected. To do this they would have to have prototypes being developed right now and this would involve a significant R&D expense that they won't go through now obviously with this announcement. However I wonder if head blueprints would already have been made and whether they would release them to an aftermarket company to make the required heads to upgrade the FG engine?

My thoughts are that would have taken the I6 to 220-230kW naturally aspirated and with better fuel economy.

If that potential was there, I think Ford USA would have considered that a bit of a threat.

[P6LTD351]

Originally Posted by Joe5619

I personally try to buy Australian made products with every purchase I make... I was planning on buying my next new car in 2017 & I so wanted it to be an all new Australian built Falcon. This won't happen now, so I'll proudly walk into a Holden dealer & buy an Australian made car!! Supporting Australian jobs is far greater than an badge at the front.


I will laugh if the dollar drops back now to $0.60 in 2016 & all those cheap & nasty imports go through the room & the local stuff stays pretty much the same..


Bloody Ford, why did you have to take the easy option!!

Why not bring forward your purchase of a Falcon to 2016?

That will keep you out of a Holden for MANY years.

[b0son]

Originally Posted by Joe5619

I will laugh if the dollar drops back now to $0.60 in 2016 & all those cheap & nasty imports go through the room & the local stuff stays pretty much the same..

As if the price would have stayed the same .... 10 years ago a base XR6 was high 30's on road. The current price?

Aus manufacturers had no qualm robbing us blind when it suited them and market conditions permitted it. Don't fool yourself, they'd gladly do the same if they were in a position to do so again.

[Road_Warrior]

Originally Posted by TMC

I was thinking about this hypothetical question today. If Falcon was selling well, and they wanted to keep producing the I6 past 2016, they would need Euro 5 compliance. At the moment the EcoLPi has Euro 6 capabilities. My thoughts are that they would have made the I6 direct injected. To do this they would have to have prototypes being developed right now and this would involve a significant R&D expense that they won't go through now obviously with this announcement. However I wonder if head blueprints would already have been made and whether they would release them to an aftermarket company to make the required heads to upgrade the FG engine?

My thoughts are that would have taken the I6 to 220-230kW naturally aspirated and with better fuel economy.

If that potential was there, I think Ford USA would have considered that a bit of a threat.

The I6 was just one engine in the Falcon/Territory range that needed Euro 5 compliance. The rest of them didnt meet it either.

Whilst for some of those engines it is purely academic as to getting them to comply, the fact remains that it would have cost $$$ to get it all engineered, tested, certified and rolled out, which collectively Ford put in the too hard basket and said "its over". For example it cost $21 Million for Euro IV compliance for the I6 but in today's dollars for all 4 engines I'd say it would be easily double if not triple that. The other alternative was using corporate V6 engines but we've been down that path and the Cyclone/D37 V6 is not an "easy" fit in the FG. Which means $$$ have to be spent on making it fit, so again we're back to square one.

[Bossxr8]

Originally Posted by TMC

I was thinking about this hypothetical question today. If Falcon was selling well, and they wanted to keep producing the I6 past 2016, they would need Euro 5 compliance. At the moment the EcoLPi has Euro 6 capabilities. My thoughts are that they would have made the I6 direct injected. To do this they would have to have prototypes being developed right now and this would involve a significant R&D expense that they won't go through now obviously with this announcement. However I wonder if head blueprints would already have been made and whether they would release them to an aftermarket company to make the required heads to upgrade the FG engine?

My thoughts are that would have taken the I6 to 220-230kW naturally aspirated and with better fuel economy.

If that potential was there, I think Ford USA would have considered that a bit of a threat.

PD had a number of direct injection I6's cobbled together to test them out. But it didn't need DI to get to Euro 5, it was fairly easy to do but the certification, testing etc was still going to cost a heap of money. It wasn't that they couldn't do it, it was just too expensive to do it.

[Brazen]

I thought Euro IV was the hard one and it was relatively easy to get to Euro V - things like a catalytic converter certified to last 160,000km.

[bigwil]

What are the chances of bringing forward the 2014 Falcon update, even six months, cause right now I think its due sometime late next year which I don't think the current FG2 will make it that far.

[Bossxr8]

It won't happen. It can't just be dragged forwards unless the whole development process goes absolutely flawlessly and ahead of time. But there's always some little problem that holds things up. Its never flawless.

[buickman]

There has been a lot of whining in the papers by media and others that it is not affecting directly with job losses about how much car companies have been given tax payer money to invest.
Ford pay taxes and also pay a large amount of employees, suppliers, logistics and advertising who all pay taxes and spend that helps keeps the economy ticking. There is more money being sucked out of the Tax payer by social welfare, illegals. Dodgy cash deals and small business that don’t declare the money they have been earning to pay their fair share of taxes. Ford just were not selling enough Falcons and Territories to make it viable to continue making cars in Australia and had some decency to give 3 years notice so employees can prepare themselves to find alternative employment with some money in their pockets and I bet most will stay to the end still doing a fine job.

[BroadyFord]

Originally Posted by Silver Ghia

Has anybody else noticed tonight they are showing heaps of Ford ads on TV? All Kuga and Focus, but not Falcon nor Territory. In fact I haven't seen a Falcon ad for ages. Its just as if they have let the Falcon die a natural death, and stuff the locally manufactured Fords.

Perhaps I'm over reacting, but I'm thinking that Ford Detroit headquarters have wanted for some time for local manufacturing to die. Despite the $1.1 billion taxpayer injection over the last 12 years. Sorry Ford, to me you have done the wrong thing.

And letting the cat out of the bag, announcing that manufacture will cease in 3 years time, how on earth can sales of the Territory and Falcon be sustained now for that period of time including a new Falcon introduction. These models have no hope now with buyer lack of confidence.

Its taken me over a day to respond to this thread, I now feel even happier that I purchased one of the best Falcons ever produced, my FG XR50 manual which I love and now intend to keep for a long time, but I'm also angry at Ford Detroit headquarters for what they have done and the way they have done it.

It seems to me that Ford Asia-Pacific/NA really haven't thought this through - they simply don't (or didn't) care about Falcon/Territory or what happens either way with local manufacturing. We are such a small and insignificant outpost that it really doesn't matter to them.

Indeed, my interpretation of the conversation at the board meeting in Dearborn last week:

Board Member 1 (BM1): "So fellas, what are we gonna do about our ops 'Down Under'?"

BM2: "Oh yeah, forgot about those guys!"

BM1: "Well, Bob says they want an answer already, so what's it gonna be?"

All other BM's: "Um......"

BM1: "Well, Bob says we've lost another $100 million down there and that most Aussies have pretty much accepted we're intent on closing in 2016."

BM2: "Well I guess that makes it easier for us then. They're close to Thailand so should be no problem supplying them from there. By the way what do we make in Australia again?"

BM1: "Falcon and Territory."

BM2: "Oh yeah."

BM1: "But we've been given money to spend on an updated version of both vehicles next year, so what about that?"

BM2: "Yeah, just let em have it..."

BM1: "Okay, I'm happy to shut it down after that."

All other BM's: "Splendid, we'll let Dave and Bob know after meeting. Next agenda item..."

And then...

Dave Schoch: "Hey Bob, we've decided to shut you down after 2014 update runs through."

Bob G: "Oh well, looks like my job here is done."

[landau460]

Falcon enthusiasts will always love the Falcon, but the general public is downsizing. Written by AG3.

They are not downsizing by choice!!!

What bloody choice have they got?

[2011G6E]

Originally Posted by landau460

Falcon enthusiasts will always love the Falcon, but the general public is downsizing. Written by AG3.

They are not downsizing by choice!!!

What bloody choice have they got?

More like the range of choices now is better than it used to be. "Small" cars aren't "small" anymore...for example look how big the Corolla and Mazda 3 have become...four cylinder cars aren't underpowered slugs, and "medium" cars and SUV's often have more interior room through better packaging than "large" cars of ten years ago now.

It's not Australian cars that have gotten worse (because they're better than ever), it's imported (and made here stuff like the Cruze, etc) that's got vastly better, giving people more choice over what was once a "natural" decision. Many years ago if you had a family and a bit of stuff to carry, you'd just normally trundle off and buy a Falcon or Commodore. Now there's a huge range of SUV's and medium sized cars that are cheaper to buy usually and cheaper to keep on the road, so why wouldn't people gravitate away from what is seen as "a big car" if they don't actually need one?

The buying public is a fickle animal, especially when it comes to a large purchase like a car...they won't, and haven't for quite some time, buy just because of the badge on the front or because a car has "made in Australia" on it.

You can't change that sort of public attitude unless you artificially keep other models of car sold here poorly made and worse equipped, or bring in strong protection of our car makers which just breeds laziness in the car makers here because they know they're selling to a captive audience who are forced to buy whatever they shove out the factory door. We don't want to go back to those bad old days.

[landau460]

Like I said "they don't have the bloody choice"

If it wasn't for price of fuel, and I have not read up about this euro 5 / 6 sounds like crap compliance we are not part of euro ,the flood of oversees appealing stuff crap or not crap we are dealing with countries that pay wages probly a tenth of ours thats what they have worked out as pay not here in Australia the cost of living with there wages we would be a third world country living in poverty , and a bloody government/s that can't get the important stuff right.

No choice

People would still have a choice of a falcon even at the price. Still not sure why we need all these things to play with ( i still dont know all the stuff in my gt does i just get in it hit the traction control off open window check tyre pressures and feel good instantly) rather than getting into it and either driving with purpose of a destination or driving for the sake of enjoyment!
I am lucky enough like a lot here of having both but it is getting harder and harder to do that.
There is probly a lot of merit to Ford HO and Foa allowing territory and falcon keeping productions up and exporting, and I thought for a bit that the way fg falcon, g6e, and territory would be favourable in U.S being rear wheel drive with a big six or an 8 cyl as an option hell in the end they tried in vain with the tree hugging Eco 4 even boss saw and liked. But the powers that be not allowing that to happen so Ford go down as in production....
They are tipping holden goingsame way don't know how that will pan out then
what?
Technology is everywhere we make a lot of it but for how long before everything we produce is not cost effective cause some company will produce it overseas for a fifth of the price!

Like I said NO CHOICE

[csv8]

What Fords might come here..
http://brisbanetimes.drive.com.au/ph...523-2k2la.html

[Road_Warrior]

Originally Posted by BroadyFord

It seems to me that Ford Asia-Pacific/NA really haven't thought this through - they simply don't (or didn't) care about Falcon/Territory or what happens either way with local manufacturing.

"It's all too hard"

Doesn't seem that way for Toyota, but anyway...

[DJM83]

Originally Posted by csv8

What Fords might come here..
http://brisbanetimes.drive.com.au/ph...523-2k2la.html

I always liked the S-Max, the Edge isnt too bad either.

[babyf6]

http://www.carsales.com.au/news/2013...d-falcon-36772

I find this article rather sums up everything

[GTP534]

"Specialist media" ??? Who's he trying to kid! Nothing constructive to add, they're all a pack of sensationalist vultures.

[Road_Warrior]

Originally Posted by GTP534

"Specialist media" ??? Who's he trying to kid! Nothing constructive to add, they're all a pack of sensationalist vultures.

That's a veiled swipe at Mr Dowling and the goons at Drivel.com.au

[JessieXT]

I have owned four Fords and love my 2008 Ford Falcon BF Mk II. It's awful news. I don't understand why a lot of the public wouldn't buy Fords especially when the bail out money was needed early in the year. Australians could have saved it but we didn't. I hate the thought of no Falcons, I'll just have to keep mine forever now !

[russellw]

Let's put this in some perspective.

Chinese automotive workers currently receive around AU$280 per month with those in the joint venture factories doing best at around AU$600 per month while their Thai counterparts receive ~AU$200 per month. The Koreans are amongst the highest paid of the Asian workers, earning around AU$3,600 per month which is slightly above the Japanese at ~AU$3,400 per month. The latter two are significant given the high percentage of our vehicles that come from those countries.

Mexican workers make around AU$620 per month which is why so much of US production is based there - particularly when the current average for a US worker is a base of AU$4,988 per month rising to almost AU$10,320 when bonuses and benefits are included! Somewhat ironically, this is actually lower than German wages which average AU$11,800 per month.

Australian wages sit somewhere between these extremes at around AU$4,500 per month which is about half the US/German model, 20% higher than Korea or Japan and more than 20 times higher than their Thai equivalents.

Energy costs are higher in Germany, lower in the US, much lower in China, Mexico and Thailand but raw material costs are slightly lower in Australia across the board.

But labour and raw materials are only part of the story ...

We have struggled in this country for much the same reasons that the US auto industry did - the German experience proves that wages alone are not a significant factor in terms of profitability but they have understood the importance of modern factories and high levels of automation as a means of keeping costs down.

I've said it before but several US plants are more than 70 years old and inherently inefficient both in terms of employee numbers and manufacturing output. We are no better, with the Ford manufacturing plant at Geelong and the Broadmeadows assembly plant both being aged facilities.

They have been modernised to some extent over the years but the fact remains that we annually produce about 17 cars per employee (although that peaked at 22 in 2008); the US about 27 per employee; the Germans around 80 per employee while the most efficient car plant globally (Nissan UK) is just over the 100 cars per employee mark annually.

While our labour costs here are half those of the Germans (or US) that is not offset by the plant inefficiency where our plant output per labour unit is only 60% of the US and less than a quarter of the German output. Simple mathematics thus makes us about twice the cost of a German manufacturer but (perhaps) on par with the US model for some of their newer plants.

Asian production figures per employee are typically not published but some guesstimates for Korea based on volumes and labour force data suggests that they are in a range from 30-55 vehicles per employee annually but this needs to be offset by the fact that the Koreans work 2,200+ hours per annum compared to our 1,693 (24% less), the USA 1,777 (20% less), Germany 1,413 (36% less) with only Mexico comparable at 2,250.

Pressure on wages throughout Asia will continue - some countries have already experienced 60% wages growth over the last few years and this is likely to continue in a repeat of what happened to the other previously low wage countries (like Japan and Taiwan) where consumerism and the desire for better living standards drove up demand for higher wages. Mexico may be an exception to that rule for longer given the large untapped labour pool but eventually there won't be as many options for the manufacturers to use.

Some food for thought at least.

Cheers
Russ