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Old 04-12-2005, 07:42 PM
GreenAndBlue GreenAndBlue is offline
Rarely post anything
 
Location: Northern IL
Hybrids: 2006 Civic Hybrid
Posts: 275
Default Re: Questions for Ford?

I will start by saying that I'm not picking on Ford specifically; indeed, they are to be commended as the only domestic manufacturer currently building hybrids in the mass market channel (sorry, Dodge, but I don't count those 300 Ram hybrids as viable 'mass-market availability').

Right now, economies of scale wouldn't allow Ford to stop advertising F150s and Explorers in favor of FEH. Remember that the F150 is Ford's bread and butter. 250,000 copies minimum of that vehicle *must* be sold, year over year, in order for them to remain profitable. With the competition in the full-sized pickup marketplace, Ford would not be wise to just abandon the segment to their competition by not continuing to promote it. 20,000 (?) FEHs are not going to take the place of 250,000 F150s - unless they were priced to offset the difference, and that's not going to happen.

Now, the other poster mentioning hybrid F150s and Explorers ? Can't happen fast enough. I only *hope* FoMoCo has plans for these in the next design cycles (F150 is only about 2yrs old now, but I think the Explorer is due for a freshening soon). And I'd lose a lot of my animus toward SUVs if they got mileage comparable to cars. Less polluting, less dependent on petroleum... I wouldn't mind seeing SUVs with one person inside & no gear, if a substantial number of them were hybrids...

.

Mark

Sometimes we could all use a little less


My hybrid automobiles:

Current:
2006 Honda Civic Hybrid (CVT, w/o Nav)
Magnetic Pearl / Blue - 008661, born 12/28/05
Mods: Neck pillows, Garmin C330 Nav, Draw-tite 1.25" hitch (for bikes, not towing!), Pioneer Inno XM receiver via Aux jack, OEM mud flaps, more to come!


Hypermiler status on 3/12/06 @ 3077mi.

Previous:
2005 Honda Accord Hybrid (5AT/Navi)
Desert Mist / Ivory - 001254
Retired 1/21/06 - LMPG 34.1

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