How will we know when the chip crisis is over?

[Cobra427]

Read on the F-150 gen14 forum that trucks are being produced again the US. So how will we know if MMEs are rolling off the line in Mexico? Do we have spies that will tip us off that production has resumed?

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[BMT1071]

MME production never stopped.

 

[bruceski88]

Read on the F-150 gen14 forum that trucks are being produced again the US. So how will we know if MMEs are rolling off the line in Mexico? Do we have spies that will tip us off that production has resumed?

Ford reports monthly production numbers as part of their financial disclosure that also show up here on the forum.

 

[Cobra427]

MME production never stopped.

So why these 24 week delivery lead times?

 

[Carsinmyblood]

So why these 24 week delivery lead times?

You ordered one too many and schmucked up the system.

....They're selling faster than they can make them.

 

[JamieGeek]

So why these 24 week delivery lead times?

You ordered one too many and schmucked up the system.

....They're selling faster than they can make them.

Yeah something about the Mach-E being "sold out"...

 

[Tamadrummer88]

Rumblings in the semiconductor industry is it’ll last well into 2022 and possibly 2023.

 

[OH2AZ2OH]

The issue with Mach E is batteries. Ford only had first year commitments from their supplier for 50000 batteries. They weren't all delivered at once. If the battery shipments were level loaded, that is approximately 1000 batteries a week. So, Mach E construction is going to be capped at a number reasonably close to 1000 a week. There might be months where they make more, but on average, that's going to be how fast they get built.

If you specifically want to know about the semiconductor shortage, the Japanese semiconductor plant that suffered the fire in March partially came back online about a month later. The plan was to be at full production about 3 - 4 months after that. Semiconductor parts were in tight supply before then, so it is will take quite a bit of time to dig out of the backorder hole even after that plant reaches full production.

Semiconductor plants are super expensive. I'd guess construction of a new plant would take about a year, with probably another 6 months of startup and qualification before full production. So if someone started building a plant right now, it wouldn't add extra capacity until late 2022/2023. That is in line with when a lot companies expect to be out of the semiconductor shortage.

 

[Cobra427]

The issue with Mach E is batteries. Ford only had first year commitments from their supplier for 50000 batteries. They weren't all delivered at once. If the battery shipments were level loaded, that is approximately 1000 batteries a week. So, Mach E construction is going to be capped at a number reasonably close to 1000 a week. There might be months where they make more, but on average, that's going to be how fast they get built....
/QUOTE]

Thanks much, great info. That aligns with a post which said the longest lead times are with cars spec'd with ER batteries, and some dealers telling customers to change to SR if they want their cars faster.
Do you happen to know how many are produced a week now?

 

[ChasingCoral]

Read on the F-150 gen14 forum that trucks are being produced again the US. So how will we know if MMEs are rolling off the line in Mexico? Do we have spies that will tip us off that production has resumed?

Production not only hasn't stopped at Cuautitlan, it never slowed appreciably.
There were a couple of parts issues and other adjustments but they had minor impacts on production rates.

 

[Tamadrummer88]

The issue with Mach E is batteries. Ford only had first year commitments from their supplier for 50000 batteries. They weren't all delivered at once. If the battery shipments were level loaded, that is approximately 1000 batteries a week. So, Mach E construction is going to be capped at a number reasonably close to 1000 a week. There might be months where they make more, but on average, that's going to be how fast they get built.

If you specifically want to know about the semiconductor shortage, the Japanese semiconductor plant that suffered the fire in March partially came back online about a month later. The plan was to be at full production about 3 - 4 months after that. Semiconductor parts were in tight supply before then, so it is will take quite a bit of time to dig out of the backorder hole even after that plant reaches full production.

Semiconductor plants are super expensive. I'd guess construction of a new plant would take about a year, with probably another 6 months of startup and qualification before full production. So if someone started building a plant right now, it wouldn't add extra capacity until late 2022/2023. That is in line with when a lot companies expect to be out of the semiconductor shortage.

To add to this, they are very expensive and capacity will be slowly ramped up. Also, yield per wafer has to be perfected as time goes on. It’s not uncommon for a fab that just started up to get like 50% die yield on every wafer they produce for the first several months. That will get better with time, especially if that fab is going with a smaller node like 10nm

 

[Cobra427]

Production not only hasn't stopped at Cuautitlan, it never slowed appreciably.
There were a couple of parts issues and other adjustments but they had minor impacts on production rates.

Thanks, great info. Is 6000 units/month their production goal? Wonder how many orders are in the backlog?

 

[ChasingCoral]

Thanks, great info. Is 6000 units/month their production goal? Wonder how many orders are in the backlog?

Yes, 6,000 per month seems about right. Remember Ford said they were making 50,000 in the first year. That's less than 9 months of 6,000/month production speed.

Looking at totals as well you get:

That's over 34,000 by the end of May. At the current rate, they should hit 50,000 total in August.

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