Ford Motor Firm has developed a brand new EV platform designed to scale back manufacturing complexity and prices, in line with Doug Discipline, 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, Discipline detailed the three-year improvement course of, describing how Ford assembled a small staff led by Alan Clarke, previously of Tesla, to work on the mission in secrecy at a California facility. The staff operated with minimal oversight and was tasked with difficult typical automotive engineering approaches.
“Physics shouldn’t be proprietary,” Discipline stated, explaining the staff’s philosophy of deep methods integration that led them to seek 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 giant, single aluminum components function each structural physique components and bases for sub-assemblies. In comparison with a standard pickup physique, the staff 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 automobile is each bit as vital because the product itself,” Discipline stated.
Ford plans to desert the standard transferring meeting line for what it calls an “meeting tree” method. The automobile shall be in-built three separate items – entrance, rear, and structural battery core – earlier than last meeting. Discipline stated this represents the primary time a automobile shall be manufactured utilizing this technique anyplace on this planet.
The effectivity enhancements are anticipated to permit Ford’s autos to attain related vary as opponents whereas utilizing batteries as much as one-third smaller. The corporate’s goal is a five-year price of possession decrease than buying a three-year-old Tesla Mannequin Y.
The midsize electrical pickup will provide extra passenger area than a Toyota RAV4 whereas together with each a entrance trunk and conventional truck mattress. The automobile will characteristic Ford’s BlueCruise hands-free driving system and what Discipline described as a “ground-up, zonal electrical structure” enabling new digital experiences.
Discipline emphasised that the electrical powertrain was important to the platform’s design philosophy, noting advantages together with residence charging functionality, cellular energy plant performance, and superior driving dynamics from the battery’s low middle of gravity and instantaneous electrical motor torque.
The manager stated he believes the first aggressive battleground, notably 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 automobile startups may wrestle.
Ford has not introduced pricing, vary specs, or launch timing for the midsize electrical pickup.
