Ford Motor Co. will pause production of its top-selling, highly profitable F-150 pickup at its Dearborn Truck Plant for the next few days.
The plant’s assembly line will stop running this evening, May 21, and remain down for Friday, Saturday and possibly Sunday, so that Ford can repair a broken hood die in a nearby stamping plant, said two people with first-hand knowledge of the situation. The people asked to not be named because they are not authorized to share that information publicly.
When the Detroit Free Press asked Ford about the situation at Dearborn Truck Plant, Ford spokeswoman Christina Audisho said, “We do not comment on day-to-day operations.”
A hood die is heavy-duty industrial mold used in a press to stamp and shape flat sheets of metal such as aluminum into the outer or inner panels of the vehicle’s hood, according to suppier TTM’s website.
According to people familiar with the plant, Ford has been running two 10-hour shifts a day at the factory and builds about 1,000 pickups across those shifts. That means a shutdown for this length of time could result in a loss of about 2,500 or more pickups.
That normally wouldn’t be too serious except for the fact that Ford leaders told investors last month the automaker is about 60,000 units short in inventory compared to the year-ago period. Ford has been scrambling to run as much production as possible to make up the inventory shortfall.
“They’re aready running all that they can to make it up and they have time to make it all up,” said one of the people. “They do super Saturdays and volunteer overtime so they’ll make it up. We’ve never not made it up.”
A “super Saturday” or “super Sunday” is when the carmaker runs an extra shift outside of the normal schedule so as to catch up on any lost production.
Ford dealers have told the Detroit Free Press they are worried about losing truck sales due to carrying thin inventory of the popular pickups, adding that the vehicles are dribbling out of the factories. Ford also makes the F-150 at its Kansas City Assembly Plant in Claycomo, Missouri.
Ford fell behind on its production after its main supplier of aluminum, Novelis in Oswego, New York, suffered two fires last fall that took down its aluminum production. That disruption in aluminum supply forced Ford to stop some of its production last year, including that of the F-Series. Ford uses aluminum in the bodies of many of its pickups and SUVs.
Earlier this year, Ford announced its plan to add 50,000 F-Series pickups to the inventory this year. The plan includes the following:
Ford’s leadership said it is working with Novelis to get it back online — though it could be later this year before F-150 inventory stabilizes.
Novelis spokesperson Julie Groover told the Free Press on March 24 that the aluminum maker expects to have the factory operational again by the end of June, though Ford’s chief operating officer indicated full inventory recovery might occur further into the second half.
(This story has been updated to include new information.)
Jamie L. LaReau is the senior autos writer for USA TODAY Co. who covers Ford Motor Co. for the Detroit Free Press. Contact Jamie at jlareau@freepress.com. Follow her on Twitter @jlareauan. To sign up for our autos newsletter. Become a subscriber.
This article originally appeared on Detroit Free Press: Ford pauses F-150 production at Dearborn Truck, sources say
Reporting by Jamie L. LaReau, Detroit Free Press / Detroit Free Press
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