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Ford Five Hundred/Mercury Montego
3623 messages, Last post on Feb 13, 2011 at 9:08 AM
You are in the Ford Five Hundred/Mercury Montego Forum.What is this discussion about? Ford Five Hundred, Mercury Montego, Sedan
#575 of 3623 Duratec 35 & Ford CVT by buckwheat
Mar 26, 2004 (4:29 pm)
From design in early 2000, to production in late 2005, almost 6 years does not demonstrate any urgency to move forward even though Fords' Roman Krygler, a group VP, stated "we saw we had a hole in our line-up in the mid range V6 area, so we designed this to fill it. "In 2003 Ford had in place "prototypes that have verified the Duratec-35 completely."So what is the delay, it is not the outsourcing major suppliers, they are in place. Die cast blocks will be supplied by a "Teksid" operation in Alabama, Duratec-35 heads will come
from "Nemak" in Mexico, crankshafts will be supplied by India's Bharat Forge. The delay is the transition of the Lima Ohio plant to "Fords Flexible Manufacturing System", with installation of CNC (computer numerically controlled) lines to machine the new engine heads and convert the existing flexible manufacturing equipment for the crankshafts. The engine block machining will be a state of the art transfer line. Of course once this revamping occurs reprogramming to another engine can take place over a weekend, (truly remarkable) and it will be the same way at every engine plant. The Cleveland Engine plant#1 comes on line in 2004 as Fords first fully flexible engine plant and as stated above can reprogram to accept, say the Duratec 35 over a weekends time, provided all the engines components are shipped there. This is not going to happen because Ford is contractually committed to the Lima plant and its union workers besides Cleveland #1 is busy making other engines. But the point is if they wanted to they could.
Additionally, Ford anticipates the majority of sales volume for Five Hundred/Freestyle/Montego will be with CVT transmissions, and now that the CVT joint venture with ZF that began in 1999 is essentially in name only since Ford bought the 51% of shares owned by ZF with Ford now having 100% ownership, who knows what the final product will be in regards to durability/longevity and quality now that it will be completely Ford. At last reports Ford did not have a CVT ready for any engine having more than 220lbs. of torque the Duratec-30 engine is rated at 200lbs. of torque. Perhaps Fords purchase of ZF shares might be the signal that Ford will outsource for larger torque CVTs capable of the higher torque Duratec-35 scheduled for some Ford vehicles sometime in 2006
As previously reported in February in the Car Connection, it is a fact that some Ford engineers have already stated the Duratec-30 is underpowered for the near 4000lb (AWD Five Hundred w/driver). Its not comforting in making a major purchase to know those who engineered this vehicle believe it to be underpowered and for me that has nothing to do with 0-60. Of course sitting behind the wheel and evaluating power will be individually subjective based on anticipated expectations.
#576 of 3623 by ANT14
Mar 26, 2004 (4:53 pm)
Very good, your information is quite correct, I'm beginning to think you might be an insider considering your got all your sourcing information correct.Here's another... Once the 3.5L becomes availble, they will outsource the CVT from Nissan, same one used in the Murano. Aisin (which supplies the auto trannies for the Mazda6 V6), might also supply Ford with a CVT able to withstand 250HP/250TQ. Although this isn't to say that ZF couldn't develop one on their own... it's all on timing.
#577 of 3623 Interesting... by rctennis3811
Mar 27, 2004 (11:34 pm)
Ford has trademarked the names TWO HUNDRED, THREE HUNDRED, FOUR HUNDRED, and SIX HUNDRED right after registering FIVE HUNDRED. I thought they were only sticking to names that start with F!?!#578 of 3623 by johnclineii
Mar 28, 2004 (3:53 am)
First, I doubt those registrations would hold water if attacked in court. Second, I have all along thought the F and M thing at Ford/Mercury was a passing fad. Third, I think the F/M thing probably came along after Nasser was tossed (which was also after the Five Hundred was named)...#579 of 3623 by ANT14
Mar 28, 2004 (9:44 am)
Sometimes names closely similar to the target name, are trademarked just incase another manufacturer decided to come up with something close to it.#581 of 3623 by nvbanker
Mar 28, 2004 (12:56 pm)
Oh, don't get me going on the F&M thing again. I HATE that! Especially when it translated into FreeWilly, er, I mean Freestar. By the way, as an owner of a new Monterey, (that name I like, it's not a stupid name), we took delivery of the wife's new Mountaineer yesterday, and I asked the owner of the dealership how the Monterey vans are selling. They aren't. Too bad too, ours has been phenomenal - a real positive surprise to us.#582 of 3623 nvbanker by rctennis3811
Mar 28, 2004 (2:08 pm)
When'd you get the Monterey? I didn't know you got one! How's the Mountaineer going? Do you still have the Navigator?#583 of 3623 by nvbanker
Mar 28, 2004 (3:56 pm)
Got the Monterey a month ago to replace my Villager that was coming off lease. The villager had 55,000 miles on it and other than constantly needing brake pads, was a good van. My courier was sort of sorry to see it go. Now, here's where the dilemna came in. I could have got a PT Cruiser for about $15,000. The Monterey stickers at $30,000, base model. (They have REALLY put a price on these new ones. No wonder they aren't selling!) But out of loyalty for my favorite L/M dealer, I leased the Monterey, and the deal was good. My courier is delighted, because this is a damn surprisingly nice van! Having rented many Windstars and feeling they were barely competent, I was amazed at how much more refined and pleasant to drive the Monterey or Freestar is. Best of all, I expected some issues with the van, since Windstars are famous for their problems - and this is brand new design. There are none so far at all. I think they may be building this one right.Only had the 04 Mountaineer a day now, it's going fine. Yes, still have the Navigator which is my main ride, and it's just excellent. Nothing yet out there that would drive me out of it.
#584 of 3623 Five Hundred grille by buckwheat
Apr 01, 2004 (6:31 pm)
J Mays is the likeable 49-year old American who has been head of Ford Motor Co's global design team since taking over from Jack Telnack in 1997, according to Mays "Expect the 3-bar grille to feature prominently on a facelifted Five Hundred in just a couple of years".To POST a message, please
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