While it's certainly not the only automaker affected by the fire at and subsequent shut-down of the Novelis aluminum plant, Ford has probably been hit the hardest. Most of its full-size and larger vehicles have fully aluminum bodies. That includes the F-150, Super Duty, Expedition, and Lincoln Navigator lines. No aluminum means no SUVs and trucks, and Ford has taken steps to conserve its supply of sheet aluminum for its more popular truck lines, pausing Lightning, Expedition, and Navigator production. However, the aluminum shortage won't last forever, and Ford has announced plans to ramp up truck production in the future to make up for the temporary shortfall.
Next Year Is Truck Season
In what seems like a sign of how much pickup truck production will be impacted for Ford while it's sorting out its aluminum shortage, it said that it will be increasing its truck production by 50,000 units next year. The ramp-up will start sometime in the first quarter of next year, about when Ford expects supply issues to be sorted out. Of the 50,000 additional vehicles, 45,000 of them will be F-150s, and the other 5,000 will be Super Duty trucks. With the added production comes additional jobs. Ford said it will be adding up to 900 positions at the Ford Rouge Complex in Dearborn, Michigan, and another 100 at the Kentucky Truck Plant in Louisville.
Ford
That brings us to an interesting aspect of Ford's production plans. The company also said that it will continue to keep production of the F-150 Lightning paused. The Lightning's Dearborn plant paused a couple of weeks ago as one of the first steps to conserve aluminum supplies. We reached out to Ford for details about how long the Lightning line would be down, and we received the following statement:
"We have good inventories of the F-150 Lightning and will bring Rouge Electric Vehicle Center (REVC) back up at the right time, but don’t have an exact date at this time." -Ford Representative
We suspect it may be for quite a while, though. The same release talking about the truck production plans mentions that Lightning plant workers will be moving over to the main F-150 plant to help out with the increased production of regular combustion and hybrid pickups that Ford says "are more profitable for Ford and use less aluminum." The shift in focus does make sense, though if you're considering buying a Lightning, you may want to consider buying one sooner than later, since while inventories might be good for now, that might not be the case a few months from now.
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This article originally appeared on CarBuzz and is republished here with permission.
