Ford Motor Firm has developed a brand new EV platform designed to scale back manufacturing complexity and prices, based on Doug Subject, the corporate’s chief EV, digital and design officer. The Ford Common Electrical Car Platform will underpin the automaker’s first midsize, four-door electrical pickup truck.
Talking at Ford’s Louisville Meeting Plant, Subject detailed the three-year growth course of, describing how Ford assembled a small workforce led by Alan Clarke, previously of Tesla, to work on the mission in secrecy at a California facility. The workforce operated with minimal oversight and was tasked with difficult standard automotive engineering approaches.
“Physics shouldn’t be proprietary,” Subject stated, explaining the workforce’s philosophy of deep programs integration that led them to search out methods for particular person components to carry out a number of capabilities whereas eliminating complexity.
The brand new platform incorporates what Ford calls “unicasting,” the place massive, single aluminum components function each structural physique parts and bases for sub-assemblies. In comparison with a standard pickup physique, the workforce eradicated three-quarters of the components, two-thirds of the welds, and half of the fasteners. {The electrical} system removes over 4,000 ft of wiring in comparison with Ford’s first-generation electrical SUV.
“The disruption to how we construct the car is each bit as necessary because the product itself,” Subject stated.
Ford plans to desert the normal shifting meeting line for what it calls an “meeting tree” strategy. The car will likely be in-built three separate items – entrance, rear, and structural battery core – earlier than closing meeting. Subject stated this represents the primary time a car will likely be manufactured utilizing this technique wherever on the planet.
The effectivity enhancements are anticipated to permit Ford’s autos to realize comparable vary as rivals whereas utilizing batteries as much as one-third smaller. The corporate’s goal is a five-year value of possession decrease than buying a three-year-old Tesla Mannequin Y.
The midsize electrical pickup will supply extra passenger area than a Toyota RAV4 whereas together with each a entrance trunk and conventional truck mattress. The car will characteristic Ford’s BlueCruise hands-free driving system and what Subject described as a “ground-up, zonal electrical structure” enabling new digital experiences.
Subject emphasised that the electrical powertrain was important to the platform’s design philosophy, noting advantages together with dwelling charging functionality, cellular energy plant performance, and superior driving dynamics from the battery’s low middle of gravity and prompt electrical motor torque.
The chief stated he believes the first aggressive battleground, significantly towards Chinese language producers, will happen within the digital realm. He expressed confidence that Ford’s mixture of innovation capabilities and established manufacturing experience positions the corporate to succeed the place each legacy automakers and electrical car startups would possibly wrestle.
Ford has not introduced pricing, vary specs, or launch timing for the midsize electrical pickup.
