Ford is making fresh efforts to double the production capacity of the F-150 Lightning electric pickup truck to 150,000 vehicles per year, the company said. That follows December news that pre-orders were limited to 200,000 units, with CEO Jim Farley saying, “We are completely oversubscribed with our battery electric vehicles.” In addition, starting Thursday, January 6th, the company is inviting the first group of reservation holders to place orders for the F-150 Lightning.
To boost production, Ford said it had created a small task force of people from manufacturing, purchasing, strategy, product development and capacity planning to find ways to accelerate production. The company is also working with key suppliers “to find ways to increase the capacity of electric vehicle parts, including battery cells, battery trays and electric propulsion systems,” the company said in a press release.
The company found that the F-150 Lightning is now in the final stages of prefabrication before moving into mass production for retail and commercial customers, with shipments beginning this spring. The aim is to test production vehicles over a million miles under real customer conditions.
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On the order page, Ford said it uses a wave-by-wave reservation process, prompting pre-orderers to look for an email invite or check their Ford.com account. The automaker stated that later pre-orders may have to wait for vehicles of the following model year. (Ford also noted that over 75 percent of reservation owners were new to the brand.)
Shipments of the 2022 F-150 Lightning Pickup will begin in Spring 2022 with an initial MSRP of $ 39,974 before any available tax incentives. However, some reports indicate this that some dealerships will charge customers up to an additional $ 30,000 to be among the first to receive their vehicles.
Ford recently announced it would triple production of the Mustang Mach-E to 200,000 units per year by 2023. To this end, the company is building its “most modern and efficient automobile production facility in its 118-year history” in Tennessee together with three battery plants that were built in cooperation with SK Innovation. All of this equates to a total investment of $ 11.4 billion with 11,000 new jobs.
The F-150 Lightning is eligible for a full $ 7,500 BEV tax credit starting today (along with all government subsidies), but Ford is expected to hit its 200,000 vehicle eligibility limit later this year. At this point the credit will gradually expire unless new law has been passed that would change the rules.
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