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Automotive News & Views What about the future of Ford Inc?? 
1858 messages, Last post on Oct 16, 2006 at 6:25 AM
You are in the Automotive News & Views Forum. Your Hosts are steve_ & claires
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Replying to: grbeck (Oct 15, 2006 4:51 am) How indeed will Ford compete? Honda has clearly mapped out a strategery to add value to their cars over the Hyundai, which is what Honda used to be. Hope that works. But Ford? This is why I feel Ford and GM are doomed at the bottom market. Discounting your way to profitability worked for Walmart, but nobody else has figured that out so well. And this is why I feel it would be a mistake to sell the Euro nameplates, because if run correctly, they could end up being what Ford becomes. It's a niche that won't go away. Nurtured properly, it may be their salvation. Ford can still be a truck maker for now at least, but they haven't done small cars in America right ever. They lose money on every Focus as it is. All it does is squash the CAFE rating for them. I would quit trying to compete with the Japanese and now Koreans in the small car biz. You can't win. |
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I have seen a lot of people point to the five hundred as a bad bad car. I haven't driven one, so i don't know, but it doesn't *seem* that bad. I mean, granted, it's not an enthusiast car, and this is an enthusiast forum. But aren't a lot of people in the market for a big car with upright seating that gets decent gas mileage and doesn't cost a lot?
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Replying to: dhanley (Oct 15, 2006 4:53 pm) The 3.0l that is in there now is a stop gap until Ford was happy with the 3.5. I think that will do a lot to address its major shortcoming. I also thought I heard they are switching from the CVT to the GM/Ford 5spd auto. Perception is a fickle thing. |
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mark on this, but somehow, deep in the recesses of many of us, me included, we all WANT Ford/GM to come out with great products that we are proud to buy, run well, last long (at least as long as the imports seem to have the reputation for going), but many of us see the imports as better because of friends or personal experience... I had two Hondas, both 1988s, that lasted 165K and 180K respectively, both with basic maintenance, oil, tires, brakes, and the major tuneups every 75K miles...I am sols on Honda... Yet, I have been buying American since 1998...a Regal, Intrepid, Sable, and now Crown Vic and Ram 1500...they are good vehicles, altho the Regal was not, and I do feel that import dashboards do not look like they are from the 60s, because they did not exist in the 60s, whereas my Crown Vic could be updated at least to the 90s, if not the new millenium... I will probably stay American, altho the Santa Fe/Veracruz SUVs do intrigue me...but after my Honda experience, I can truly see why folks who try Toyota or Honda desert the Big 3 forever... |
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This car is about a B- when Ford really needed an A+ Mark |
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| The excitement that existed with the Ford Taurus from 1986 until the disasterous re-style of 1996 will not happen with the current Ford 500- too plain vanilla. But I always thought that it would make a swell taxicab or fleet vehicle- heck, maybe a police car. At some point the old Crown Vic has to die, I doubt if Ford wants to replace it with another big V8 rear drive car. But the room and trunk space of the Ford 500 would make it seem like a fleet dream car. | |
| Let's talk more specifically about Ford's most recent issue in our Ford Recall Woes discussion. This one's gotten a bit general, but specific new topic ideas are welcome! | |
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