I think some of you know that I'm a Ford guy. However, that said, I'm not some uncritical boob that'll buy anything Ford makes just because of the blue oval. And lately it's been harder and harder to keep a stiff upper lip considering all the gaffes that Ford makes.
Not that Ford hasn't made some awesome iron lately. The Mustang was a hell of a coup, so was the Ford GT. And sadly they've cancelled the GT and are probably thinking of all sorts of ways to ruin the Mustang's retro looks. Nonetheless it's a source of pride for me to think that I can go in at any time and buy the beautiful car that is a Mustang.
Then there's all the
other cars they make.
Oh boy...
Firstly, they're not that great looking, but much more worryingly is that they seem to have been designed by bean counters and mental defectives.
Just look at this...
US Focus VS rest of the world Focus
I realize I've put the Cabrio/Coupe version, but it's the closest thing to a Coupe Focus they have. Anyway... which one would YOU rather buy?
Fusion VS Mondeo
They're in the same market "niche" of mid-size cars. Which is prettier? I'll admit that I took the worst looking pic of the Mondeo and the best looking pic of the Fusion I could find. And the fact that they look about equal that way is very telling at how much nicer the Mondeo is.
Taurus VS Falcon
Let's go down under to find our full size car equivalent. Since Ford's decided to cancel Crown Vic sales to the public and replace the old dinosaur with the Taurus, it means that our Taurus and the Aussie Falcon (Fairmount Ghia in that picture, I wanted the closest thing to a "US" variant that I could get.) are in competition. Suprisingly they look alike, but there's really no competition is there?
Lastly... US Ranger VS rest of the world Ranger
This time it's a clear win for us (IMO anyway) but why don't we have a four door variant?
I posted these pics to point something out. All these cars look enough alike to make you wonder why the HELL Ford even bothers to design cars specifically for the American market? Why not share design costs, make the damn things everywhere and save a little money? They're already bleeding cash from every pore like they have financial ebola? What is the problem? The Ranger especially is so close to it's world variant that it's shocking that they don't just do a mild front end redesign to fix that ugly bug eyes look of the world Ranger and just sell it here.
Worst of all... Ford wants to cancel the Econoline and sell the Transit here. After getting sued like crazy for van rollovers they're going to sell the top heavy Transit?????? They won't bring over the Mondeo or Focus or Ranger or Falcon but they'll bring over something that's likely to get the sued like crazy???
Ford's got the dumb. I just hope they cure themselves of it before a buyout. Would be a shame to lose the Mustang.
As a former Ford owner, I'd have to agree that their current lineup could use some work.
The Mustang, and the trucks are top notch, but there is really nothing else.
I look back to the late '80s and early '90s where performance was across the lineup
T-Bird S/C, Probe GT Turbo, Taurus SHO, Lightning, Mustang 5.0 GT/LX/Cobra!
It was hard not to want to drive any of those. but currently, its easy to look elsewhere.
The anwser is simple. Ford's design team are dumber than a box of rocks. They try their hardest and the best they can come up with is the crap that is out for you guys to buy.
"Project 69'"
1969 Chevrolet C/10, 1/2 ton, 2wd
-Boosted LS1?
-Richmond ROD 6-speed(will get sometime)
-Posi 12-bolt(built w/eaton posi unit and richmond 3.73 gears)
-Disc brake and 5 lug swap
+little extras
Ford USA needs an Enema. 'Nuff said.
werd GAM
HOLY HELL ITS BACK!!!
In Loving Memory of Phil Martin December 14 2005
Alexis: Dustin, you're ghey, lol. I am better. I have tits, and tits rule all.
ive never been a ford fan (with a few exceptions on random makes/models) but i'll agree with you....it seems theyve been putting out some really weak sauce recently. id imagine theyre just trying to make the most bland, middle-of-the-road, inoffensive designs in hopes of attracting american buyers. what they are missing in that equation, however, is that by not taking any risks they cant have any breakout successes either. maybe once they get their core centered again they can branch back out and stop making turdballs.
Is that Global Ranger based on a nissan frontera ???
"Formerly known as Jammit - JBO member since 1998" JBOM | CSS.net
Jookycola wrote:Is that Global Ranger based on a nissan frontera ???
It's based on the world Mazda B-series truck. Ford makes compact trucks for North America, Mazda makes it for the rest of the world. Again, I ask, why? Why didn't they jointly design it. Ford the frame/body and Mazda the engines/transmissions? Would have been awesome no?
I think I've figured out what's wrong with Ford, the thing that always nagged me about them. It's that they always seem to wrestle defeat from the jaws of victory. They have this habit of building market leading, impressive cars that are totally ahead of their time (or exactly what the public wants) and then making no effort at all to keep improving them. The Falcon, the Mustang, the Escort, the Taurus, the Explorer, the Ford GT.
Every time they suddenly find themselves market leaders with their fingers on the pulse of their clients, either by leading the field (Falcon/Mustang/ect...) careful planning (the F-series trucks) or just plain luck (Crown Vic cop car) they seem to have no flipping clue as to what to DO with this success. They just sort of sit there afraid to do anything until other companies (IE: GM) top them.
Just look at how much better the 1967-69 Camaro is compared to the 1967-70 Mustang. Or how the 1968-72 Chevy Nova totally blows away the 1966-70 Falcon (and even the 1970-77 Maverick). It's the same thing every time. Ford pulls a no-holds barred win out of a hat, then goes... durrrrrr, and leaves it at that. The Taurus. GOD! That car sold like crazy. In fact, It was arguably the first really modern car. What did they do? They left it as is for nearly 10 years while GM took more and more of that market with the Lumina/Grand-Prix/Regal and Cutlass Supreme. In fact, it only took GM that long because of it's financial woes at the time. I'm sure if they'd had more money they could have kicked Ford in the nads around 1990 instead of 1996.
The most heartbreaking one was the Ford GT. Ford makes a supercar, an actual no fooling SUPERCAR. And it's one of such amazing power and style that everyone likes it regardless of their taste in brands. So what does Ford do with all this acclaim and praise? Designs a new seven liter (427 cubic inch) V12 engine in cunjunction with Jaguar to transform the GT from a pretty amazing supercar to simply THE best supercar in all the world? Nope... they cancel the freakin' car. Bye automotive respect and praise! We'll miss you!
Then there's the habit of spending money to design identical cars for different markets. Look... I know they got burned with the (1994-1999) Mondeo and Focus, but that was because at the time the market trend was towards bigger more american cars with more power; while the Mondeo, and especially Focus, were very stodgy european cars with tiny engines. Now the trend is reversed and Ford is still cowering in the corner.
I think I know what the problem is though. Ford of USA, Ford of UK and Ford of Australia are all in competition with
each other. All three companies refuse to share their proprietary designs so they won't get ripped off. That's why we didn't get the amazing early 90's Escort here or get the new Mondeo and Aussie Falcon. They'll let us have them, but only if
they build them. (Well, maybe not the Mondeo, I think that one is just a case of already having pissed money away on the Fusion/Taurus and needing to sell a few of those before importing the better car.) Sadly, I totally understand, but it still is mind boggling to me that Ford is too busy fighting with itself to deal with the rapidly changing world car market. No wonder that organized and inter-departmentally co-operative Toyota is wiping the floor with everyone. British-Leyland did that sort of infighting in the 70's, now they're gone. GM went through a similar thing in the late 70's/early 80's, and it almost ruined them. AMC? Dead. Chrysler? Just biding it's time before it's sold to the Russians or some damn thing.
The sound of fighting within the gates is always Gabriel's Trumpet to a car company. A sign of coming doom.
Ford can't afford this sort of foolishness. If it doesn't want to become a subsidiary of Chery Motors of Tata, it had better get it's collective head out of it's ass and start working together in order to make the company great. All the elements are there, it just has to exploit them.
Still, I'm not holding my breath, only Ford could have made a tiny company like Austin-Martin unprofitable. How hard is it to make money when you sell "price-is-no-object" cars? Jesus.
Imma be a GM man darn soon if this keeps up.
I have worked on Fords for a Dealership. I wasnt fond of them to start with, but after seeing their "innovating designs" i will never own one of those POS. A tune-up on the newer V-8 can involve removal and reinstallion of the heads due to the movement and redesign of the spark plugs. What was wrong with the location that has worked for what? 50 years?
"Project 69'"
1969 Chevrolet C/10, 1/2 ton, 2wd
-Boosted LS1?
-Richmond ROD 6-speed(will get sometime)
-Posi 12-bolt(built w/eaton posi unit and richmond 3.73 gears)
-Disc brake and 5 lug swap
+little extras
i dunno, i like the fusion style better than the mondeo, but maybe i am just weird
and i bet if they sold the focus vert over here, it would sell pretty well considering that there are virtually zero compact convertibles
the only fords I have take a likening to in a long time are the f-150 and the mustang. taking my truck to the dealership to get work done I have wondered around a few different ford lots and have seen NOTHING outside of the f-150 or mustang you would get me to spend money on.
as far as the f-150, I own one obviously. my selling points on that truck, cheapest in the class, good looking, and tough as nails. (I bottomed out my truck 2wice playing off road within the first 300 miles of owning it and it shows no signs of battle damage).
but here is where ford @!#$ up. horsepower. in order to get the 5.4 you have to have 4wd. all 2wd have the 4.6. 250hp and 300tq is not alot for a 5400lb truck. and at the same time it gets the worst gas milage in its class. kind of dumb to have that low power numbers for a truck whos STX and FX2 styling packages SCREAM street truck. especially when you can get a GMC seierra 1500 with a 6.0 on the 2wd chassis and STILL get better gas milage.
I am also bitter there is now 3rd gen f-150 lighting. the saleen and roush editions are sweet, but there still needs to be a lightning /end F-150 rant/
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Those so naive, so hard headed, so narcissistic, that think that buy their own efforts can single handedly change the world, are always the ones that do.
NUTCASE . wrote:the only fords I have take a likening to in a long time are the f-150 and the mustang. taking my truck to the dealership to get work done I have wondered around a few different ford lots and have seen NOTHING outside of the f-150 or mustang you would get me to spend money on.
as far as the f-150, I own one obviously. my selling points on that truck, cheapest in the class, good looking, and tough as nails. (I bottomed out my truck 2wice playing off road within the first 300 miles of owning it and it shows no signs of battle damage).
but here is where ford @!#$ up. horsepower. in order to get the 5.4 you have to have 4wd. all 2wd have the 4.6. 250hp and 300tq is not alot for a 5400lb truck. and at the same time it gets the worst gas milage in its class. kind of dumb to have that low power numbers for a truck whos STX and FX2 styling packages SCREAM street truck. especially when you can get a GMC seierra 1500 with a 6.0 on the 2wd chassis and STILL get better gas milage.
I am also bitter there is now 3rd gen f-150 lighting. the saleen and roush editions are sweet, but there still needs to be a lightning /end F-150 rant/
I checked on the website, the dumb part is that you can get the 5.4 in base XL trim 2x4 without the flareside, but not in STX.
This is exactly what I mean. For a time, back in the 80's, the F-150s were the best trucks you could buy. Not because you got the most powerful engines or most modern designs, but simply because you could order almost anything with anything. You wanted an unkilled straight 6 powered F250 with a granny gear 4 speed manual (low gear + 3 forward speeds) with no options except for a heavy duty suspension as a yard truck? You got it. You wanted a base F-150 with a 351 V8 and a 5 speed manual as a budget sport truck? No problem. Just check the boxes and you could have it. But Ford did what it usually does and just let the whole line flounder until it was totally outdated by 1996. Then, it "modernized" them so bad that the 150's lost all their rugged good looks and tough as nails underpinnings (Luckily the F250s took up a lot of slack for the guys who wanted something macho). At the same time GM kept making boxier/manlier trucks until Ford finally figured out that no one wants an effeminate looking pickup and changed the F150's for the better in 2004. But again, in their usual monkey-at-the-wheel approach to upgrading models, what they forgot to change was the power.
The new 2009+ trucks address this with the addition of a probably very fuel efficient 330hp 4.4 Turbodiesel (Which shows that someone woke up at the switch for just a minute) and an ecoboost V6 (340hp to 430hp) as another possible option. However, it's inexcusable that they waited almost 10 years to do any sort of class leading upgrade to the line of vehicles that are the backbone of their company.
