So much for auto sales slowing to a crawl. As expected, things are beginning to pick up. So much so in fact, summer vacations are being cut short and planned plant shutdowns are being shortened also. The best part is these engines are being sold at a nice fat premium…
BROOK PARK, Ohio — Some Ford workers in Brook Park will have to cut short their summer vacations next month. Orders for pickups with smaller, more fuel-efficient engines are coming in faster than the automaker expected, and it’s scrambling to meet demand.
“We’re only going to take one week of shutdown this year” as opposed to the more traditional two-week stoppage, said Pete Johnson, building chairman at Ford’s Cleveland Engine Plant No. 1 for the United Auto Workers Local 1250. He added that the 869 workers there will be able to make up the lost vacation time later in the year.
“Our supplier plants will probably work straight through” the traditional July shutdown, Johnson added.
Last month, for the first time in the truck’s history, V-6 engines outsold their V-8 counterparts in the F-150. Ford had been hoping that its new engines would be popular, but it thought it was going to take longer to hit those numbers.
Engine Plant No. 1 makes two V-6 engines used in Ford’s F-150 pickup – the 3.7-liter base engine for the vehicle and the 3.5-liter EcoBoost, a turbocharged model that has become Ford’s flagship in the truck world.
“Demand for V-6s in the F-150 has far exceeded our projections,” Ford spokesman Richard Truett said in an email. “The blend of outstanding performance and class leading fuel economy is exactly what consumers are looking for.”
Andy O’Donnell, sales manager for Valley Ford Truck Sales in Valley View, said the EcoBoost engine has been tough to keep in stock.
“In most cases, they’re sold before they even get here,” O’Donnell said. He added that he was as surprised as Ford officials in Michigan at how quickly customers have taken to the new truck models.
O’Donnell said the 3.7-liter V-6 used as the truck’s base engine hasn’t been flying off the lot as quickly, but it has proven popular with corporate fleets that buy dozens of trucks at a time. Less powerful than the EcoBoost model, the base V-6 still offers more horsepower and a higher towing capacity than the V-8 models it replaced.
Ford’s new EcoBoost system uses direct fuel injection and turbocharging to boost the power of a smaller engine, while reducing emissions.
Ford’s Cleveland Engine Plant No. 1 in Brook Park will make the engines.
By adding direct fuel injection and two turbochargers to the smaller V-6 engine, Ford was able to get power and towing numbers that exceeded most of its big V-8 models. It was also able to charge more, putting nearly a $2,000 premium on the smaller engine.
To meet increasing demand for the engines, Truett said the Brook Park plant is running two full shifts daily. He would not say if Ford was considering adding a third shift as it has in Lima where workers make similar 3.5-liter and 3.7-liter engines for cars and crossovers.
Johnson said workers at Engine Plant No. 1 had been on a 50-hour-a-week schedule until this week when parts shortages from suppliers meant going back to eight-hour days.
Workers at the plant said they haven’t had a Saturday off in weeks and a few joked that they were considering passing around an empty coffee can to avoid taking bathroom breaks.
Mike Gammella, president of the UAW Local 1250, said Ford’s problem is a good problem to have. Struggling to meet demand for a new engine is much better than struggling with declining sales.
He added that workers in Brook Park are doing their part, but Ford has suppliers making critical parts for the vehicles such as cylinder heads. He and other union leaders have been encouraging Ford to bring more of those jobs back into its own shops so they’ll be better able to meet surging demand when the company has a hot product.
“We need to find a way to solve this problem,” Gammella said. “We need these parts to do that.”