Ford Motor Co. has suspended manufacturing and halted shipments of the F-150 Lightning electrical pickup after a battery caught fireplace throughout a pre-delivery high quality test.
Manufacturing at Ford‘s Rouge Electrical Car Heart in Dearborn, Michigan, has been stopped till a minimum of the top of subsequent week.
The automaker mentioned in a press release that it has no purpose to consider electrical pickups already in use by clients are affected by the battery situation.
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“By the top of subsequent week, we count on to conclude our investigation and apply what we be taught to the truck’s battery manufacturing processes,” Ford spokeswoman Emma Bergg mentioned within the assertion. “This might take a couple of weeks.”
The fireplace occurred at an outside lot close by in Dearborn the place automobiles are held for high quality checks. The truck with the battery drawback and two close by automobiles had been broken by the fireplace, Bergg mentioned. No accidents had been reported.
The corporate believes it has recognized the basis explanation for the battery drawback, together with the possible inhabitants of vans affected by it. “We monitor car information to assist guarantee our automobiles are performing as anticipated within the area,” Bergg mentioned.
The corporate will proceed to carry accomplished vans till engineering and manufacturing modifications are made.
Batteries for the vans are equipped by SK Innovation, a Korean provider with a manufacturing facility in Georgia.
The manufacturing halt comes at an inopportune time for Ford, which has struggled with high quality points, remembers and excessive guarantee prices for a number of years.
The issue additionally stops manufacturing of a well-liked product. Bergg mentioned the corporate remains to be working via a backlog of practically 200,000 reservations for the F-150 Lightning because it stopped taking them in December 2021. Reservation holders put down $100 deposits, which Ford was changing to orders.
Final yr, Ford offered greater than 15,000 of the vans in its first full yr of manufacturing.
There have been earlier issues with the lithium-ion batteries utilized in most electrical automobiles. Fires within the batteries can burn extremely popular and take 1000’s of gallons of water to extinguish, which has prompted issue for firefighters making an attempt to place out battery fires in a number of Teslas after crashes. General Motors, Hyundai, BMW and others have issued remembers of the batteries.
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