Ford Confirms F-Series Hybrid Bound for Dearborn, Celebrates Rouge's 100th Birthday

by Matt Posky

September 27th, 2018 4:32 PM

ford confirms f series hybrid bound for dearborn celebrates rouges 100th birthday

Ford confirmed the assembly locale of its F-150 Hybrid this week, saying the electrified pickup would not stray from its aluminum-bodied brethren. The hybridized F-Series will, unsurprisingly, go into production at the Rouge’s Dearborn Truck Plant in 2020, with additional (non-hybrid) production handled by Ford’s Kansas City Assembly.

The automaker made the announcement as part of its 100th anniversary celebration of the River Rouge Complex. While that left the F-150 proclamation a little light on details, Ford previously said the model would probably not be a plug-in hybrid, but would boast outlets for electrically powered tools/devices — functioning as a mobile generator. However, the announcement itself focused primarily on celebrating the Rouge’s centennial.

“Just as the Rouge has been a harbinger of progress for a century, Ford is committed to ensuring our trucks continue to power the world in a sustainable way — whether they are powered by EcoBoost engines, hybrid powertrains, or are fully electric,” said Bill Ford, executive chairman of the Ford Motor Company.

Ford also said it will launch a volunteer program with Friends of the Rouge, a local NGO that cleans up and preserves the Rouge River. Paid volunteers will work with the group to clean up litter, clear vegetation, and participate in hikes to learn more about area’s history, according to the automaker.

The F-150 Hybrid’s launch is likely to coincide with that of the fully electric performance crossover with a potentially inappropriate name and a hybridized Mustang, all of which are slated for a 2020 launch. There are also some loose rumors that the company will bring in a second electrified police vehicle to complement its Police Responder Hybrid Sedan that year. All told, Ford is investing $4.5 billion over the next five years to produce 13 hybrid or fully electric vehicles.

[Image: Ford Motor Co.]

#DearbornTruckPlant #ElectricVehicles #FSeries #F-150Hybrid #Ford #FordF-150 #FordMotorCo #Hybrids #PickupTrucks #ProductionPlanning #TheRouge

Comments

Join the conversation

12 of 48 comments

Luke42 on Sep 27, 2018

A hybrid F-150 is intriguing. While I'm most interested in green cars, I've owned several pickup trucks over the years. A 5-seat tow vehicle would be nice, and a hybrid drivetrain would fix most of the driavability annoyances that plagued the last two Fords I've owned (and an Escape V6 and a 4.3L F-150, both from MY2004). I became irritated with the driving experience in both vehicles. At the time, Ford was trying too hard to butch it up to match their marketing, and they succeeded -- to the detriment of both vehicles. The recipe was a coarse and unrefined family car, while the F-150 applied an awful lot of sound and fury under the hood just to move it's overweight self down a suburban street. Hybrids are much smoother and quieter, and they save gas too!

Like Reply
- See 6 previous
- Brandloyalty on Sep 28, 2018
  
  I speculate the tow rating will be low. At least with the drivetrain of the Escape Hybrid, almost all the meager engine braking available goes away once regeneration fills the battery to the maximum charge allowed. At low speeds even the regenerative braking is unimpressive. After regen stops, there is only slight engine braking from higher rpms. This means all braking is then being done with the mechanical brakes. This may be ok most of the time, but not descending a long steep mountain grade with a heavy trailer. Hence a conservative rating. It may be a different story if the hybrid pickup is equipped with a normal transmission.
  
  Like
- Scoutdude on Sep 28, 2018
  
  @brandloyalty Not a problem, the newer Ford Hybrids have a "overdrive" cancel button for increased engine braking without the need to go to the L setting for a lot of engine braking. The stuff I have read indicates that they will not have a lower tow rating than the base truck, but they certainly won't be available with the Max Tow or Max Payload packages.
  
  Like
- Ttacgreg on Sep 28, 2018
  
  There are some nice advantages to a hybrid drivetrain. Regen braking lowers brake wear. If like Toyota hybrid drivetrains, the vehicle travels with the gas motor at 0 rpm, then there is less motor wear. (According to the dash displays, my '16 Prius has traveled 20% of its miles with the gas motor off) The electric motors provide instantaneous response and peak torque at 0RPM. Finally of course, is better fuel efficiency. As this site has pointed out many times, increasing a 15 mpg pickup by 2mpg conserves way more gas than boosting all the 40+ mpg cars up to say 50. On another note, concerning the comments on here about ride height. I wonder if there will come a time when they start lowering pickup trucks with no loss in functionality in order to reduce frontal surface area to ease aerodynamic losses.
  
  Like
- Scoutdude on Sep 28, 2018
  
  @ttacgreg Ford is way ahead of Toyota in engine stopped operation. The system used in the C-Max and current gen Fusion and MKZ can stop the engine at up to 85mph, though initially they were limited to 65mph. The older versions could do 42mph back when the Toyotas could only do 20 something.
  
  Like
- DenverMike on Sep 28, 2018
  
  @ttacgreg No matter what you do to their nose/frontal area or ground clearance, there's way too much turbulence in the bed plus abrupt, straight up, rear glass and tailgate. It's best to maximize pickup's usefulness and leave it up to drivetrain or other tech to do the rest. Possibly 100 psi tires and active suspension.
  
  Like
- JimZ on Sep 29, 2018
  
  @Scoutdude honestly I think that's mostly to do better on the fuel economy test; the non-plug-in hybrids (Prius included) don't have enough battery capacity to travel any meaningful distance at those speeds.
  
  Like
- Scoutdude on Sep 30, 2018
  
  @JimZ It is not necessarily about going a significant distance under battery power at those speeds and all about the fact that if the engine isn't turning then it isn't burning any fuel nor creating any drag. However they can end up going some good distance at speed under battery power as they are set up so that when the engine does start back up it runs at a higher output and charges the battery for the next time it can run on battery power. With our MKZ and C-Max after a run down into town there more than half of the miles will be covered with the engine stopped. Now back up to home only about 25% of the distance will be covered engine off due to the altitude change between the two.
  
  Like
Brandloyalty on Sep 28, 2018

Funny how a hybrid pickup comes along and there are no comments in the article or by readers about: - excessive payback times, - expensive battery replacement, - virtue signalling, - lithium shortages, - rare metal mining pollution, - rare metal mining human rights abuses, - poor highway mileage, - toxic waste of old batteries, - diesels get mileage just as good. Did I miss any of the classic hybrid myths?

Like Reply
- See 2 previous
- Ttacgreg on Sep 28, 2018
  
  Just wait. Certainly there is a small subset who would consider a hybrid pickup truck to be unmanly.
  
  Like
- Brandloyalty on Sep 28, 2018
  
  @ttacgreg For them there is an option package that has a diesel engine and exhaust noise simulator, a fake non-toxic rolling coal generator, and plastic animal genitals for the trailer hitch.
  
  Like
- JimZ on Sep 29, 2018
  
  @brandloyalty heh, should go into business selling bags of copier toner as "coal rolling kits."
  
  Like