This interview with Farley literally answers every software gremlin post on this site

[DevSecOps]

Now you are changing your argument. I was responding to you saying that Ford was "incompetent" for not delaying production to come out with a more expensive vehicle.

I'm not changing anything. I'm speaking to different things. I think it's incompetent to develop a car with many different parts that can't communicate well together then go to an interview with excuses admitting that you knew all along. Especially when the GTs came out many of us felt dupped by Ford marketing. It was all over this forum. They know they over promised and under committed from the get go.

Sponsored

 

[JamieGeek]

I think Ford is probably happy with the approach they took. That said, if Ford fails to deliver on their 2nd generation of EVs, that will be embarrassing.

3rd generation of EVs.

Ford did produce a little known car called the Focus Electric.

Mach-E is 2nd generation (and I don't care if Ford calls it 1st generation).

Yes I know Ford outsourced most of the Focus Electric (Magna for powertrain and someone else for batteries--I think it was LG Chem)

 

[JamieGeek]

I'm not changing anything. I'm speaking to different things. I think it's incompetent to develop a car with many different parts that can't communicate well together then go to an interview with excuses admitting that you knew all along. Especially when the GTs came out many of us felt dupped by Ford marketing. It was all over this forum. They know they over promised and under committed from the get go.

The thing that I don't get about the Mach-E is: Why is it working so bad?

Let me explain: Ford has been using this model for years now. Vendors have been making modules in the cars for years now. The Lincoln's have dozens of modules in them and they work (for the most part--better than some of our experiences with the Mach-E).

Is the EV part that hard that it messes with the other stuff? Is the OTA architecture messing with all the other functionality that has been, more or less, bullet proof (yeah ok Mach-E is the only car with Paak).

Perhaps Ford pushed the vendors too hard introducing too many features in the Mach-E? (probably the likely scenario)

 

[phil]

3rd generation of EVs.

Ford did produce a little known car called the Focus Electric.

Mach-E is 2nd generation (and I don't care if Ford calls it 1st generation).

Yes I know Ford outsourced most of the Focus Electric (Magna for powertrain and someone else for batteries--I think it was LG Chem)

What was the generation number of the Ford Ranger EV?

 

[DevSecOps]

Perhaps Ford pushed the vendors too hard introducing too many features in the Mach-E? (probably the likely scenario)

I agree... This or Ford should have just stuck with what they were good at and not promised all that they did. This is the ACP/AA argument. Those companies that aren't implementing it set the expectation. There's nothing to complain about when you don't have those expectations.

It amazes me how some of you (not you specifically Jamie) can defend these things knowing that 80% of this forum is based on problems with the MME. It's the same ones over and over and over again. Just because you don't use PaaK doesn't mean that I don't want to, or Mike, Mary or Sam don't want to. I was sold a car with PaaK, it should work. If Ford thought it was so hard, they shouldn't have offered it. I would have never expected it.

 

[MacherAWD]

My hatch opens on its own as it does for many other owners. I don't think those retirees want their walkers and oxygen tanks to get stolen.

Mine did this once, last September. I turned off kick to open and it didn't happen again. I hadn't really used the kick feature anyway.

 

[DevSecOps]

Mine did this once, last September. I turned off kick to open and it didn't happen again. I hadn't really used the kick feature anyway.

There's huge threads on this issue. Turning off kick to open worked for some, not for me and others. Many people had damages to their car due to it opening into the garage. I had my entire hatch replaced in an attempt to fix it, and it didn't work.

I can't leave personal belongings in the car for fear of it randomly opening. There's no excuse for that. I understand that not everyone has that issue. Good for those who don't. But there's a lot of us who do and having to file insurance claims because your car randomly opens is where many of us draw, one of many, lines.

Also, your point of having to disable a feature that you paid for in order to protect your belongings and property is exactly the type of excuses that all of my comments in this thread are directed at. Regardless of you using it or not, you paid for it. Some people want that feature that didn't pay for it. It shouldn't be riddled with serious bugs if you paid for it. We shouldn't be defending Ford like this (just disable that feature that you paid for - or else). Sometimes I wonder if Farley reads the forums and puts together a list of excuses that we make for them.

 

[MacherAWD]

There's huge threads on this issue. Turning off kick to open worked for some, not for me and others. Many people had damages to their car due to it opening into the garage. I had my entire hatch replaced in an attempt to fix it, and it didn't work.

I can't leave personal belongings in the car for fear of it randomly opening. There's no excuse for that. I understand that not everyone has that issue. Good for those who don't. But there's a lot of us who do and having to file insurance claims because your car randomly opens is where many of us draw, one of many, lines.

Also, your point of having to disable a feature that you paid for in order to protect your belongings and property is exactly the type of excuses that all of my comments in this thread are directed at. Regardless of you using it or not, you paid for it. Some people want that feature that didn't pay for it. It shouldn't be riddled with serious bugs if you paid for it.

Agreed with what you say. I just have a different outlook, imo the car is better than I expected, so pleasantly surprised. Also I have a different model, no 5 sec which would have really ticked me off.

 

[Mach1E]

You know I defended Ford for a long time. It finally wore on me because of lack of transparency, failure to fix bugs, and regression. Yes we all had hopes of the promise to improve the car over time.

Being real about it... I don't know where my car has improved in 2 years, except for a slightly better charge curve. GTs came with BC. GTs came with frunk access. PaaK worked better when I first got the car. I didn't experience profile bugs or drive mode bugs until this year, UI got worse. For gosh sakes we can't even get real release notes... Can we blame Bosch for that too?

Farley's comments come off to me as preemptive to more bad news. We can't give you BC 1.2, because it's too hard with all our vendors, as an example. He's full of excuses and some people might be sympathetic to those excuses. I'm not.

My car has definitely improved over the last two years.

The bugs have mostly gotten squashed.

Here was my bug list a year ago:

Headlight switch

Profile issue

Memory seat issue

Parking sensor screen issue

Volume control fault

Charge fault

Recall

Blind spot system fault

Cross traffic system fault

Reverse brake assist not available

Driver selectable system fault Service required.

Suspension fault speed limited to 80 mph

Auto ac blower low speed after starting

Screen slow loading


Here is my bug list today-
Headlight switch

Auto ac blower low speed after starting


And there is a fix for the headlight switch and I haven’t bothered to talk to the dealer about the 2nd one (a/c auto never goes to auto when I start the car, until I change the temp or hit the auto speed again).

Everything else was fixed with software updates.

 

[DevSecOps]

My car has definitely improved over the last two years.

Out of your list I have the headlight switch, profile and seat location since day 1. Most of the other ones you listed I never had. Some of them I have now that I didn't have back then. For me none of the issues that I've had have been addressed. I still have the profile issue and seat location issue. I tried to get a replacement headlamp switch and was denied. Maybe I'm just unlucky. I think PaaK improved for a while, but then it just got even worse. All the other bugs that I have now I didn't have originally. I'm glad some of yours got addressed.

 

[Mach-Lee]

Is the EV part that hard that it messes with the other stuff? Is the OTA architecture messing with all the other functionality that has been, more or less, bullet proof (yeah ok Mach-E is the only car with Paak).

Perhaps Ford pushed the vendors too hard introducing too many features in the Mach-E? (probably the likely scenario)

I think the hard part is getting powertrain modules from 5 different manufactures to talk to each other seamlessly without standardization. We have a front inverter by Magna, a rear inverter by BorgWarner, a PCM by Bosch, a battery control module by LG, and an on-board charger from someone like Hella. I'm sure it went to the lowest bidder for each. If there's a bug with something, those companies probably all want to point fingers at each other.

The mistake was making the decision to go with that many different companies and thinking it could be made to work reliably. They should have just gone with everything from one company like Magna, if they did I think we would have way less problems. The architecture is just so complicated and doesn't make sense sometimes. For example, why does the rear motor inverter control the PTC heater instead of the HVAC module? Another example—there are a half dozen coolant pumps and valves, and practically each one is controlled by a different module even though they are all located in the same area under the frunk. I have a hard time remembering which pump is controlled by which module. It would have made much more sense to have just one front module controlling all the fans, pumps, and valves rather than 5 different modules each doing one little part. Same thing when charging, instead of a just couple modules active while charging, it's like a dozen that have to be awake and functioning, and if one has an issue it can shut down the whole works. The Mach-E is a patchwork quilt of wayward modules all trying to work together.

 

[RickMachE]

#TechWeenies LOL

I always find it amusing that people in the tech world in California think that their perspective, and lifestyle, somehow mirrors America. Couldn't be further from reality. Top 1% of income.

I have a friend that was very successful in the tech world, multiple companies, 10s of millions. We share a lot in common, except wealth and his Apple fan boy status. If Apple put out a pile of dogcrap with IOS installed, he would buy it. When they hold a tech release announcement, he analyzes every word. He also realizes that the majority of us couldn't give a crap.

I come here to learn about the Mach-E, relay the little I have learned to others, and share our interest in the vehicle. I don't come to read about people crapping on it or the company. We all know Ford has issues.

I guess I'm back to ignoring you Todd. Enjoyed the banter, but now that you're on to another brand no reason to listen to the negativity.

 

[SWO]

If Ford is completely writing their software for the first time, I'm not sure whether to expect the software on Gen2 to be better or worse than what we have now...

They did it for the precursor to Sync (Ford MyTouch?). It was so bad that they paid Microsoft a ton of money to make Sync.

 

[Tha_Ape]

I follow this forum mostly for a friend who has a 21 GTPE and doesn't really do the forum thing. I also have an interest in various EVs (I'm on the Hyundai HI5 forums too).

That said, I think Ford did a decent job for their first EV and getting it out ahead of most of the competition. When I was looking at cars in early '21, the MME Rt1 made it to the final 3 list (along with a Rav4 Prime and a MYLR).

I think the 5sec thing would bother me if I went the GT route or the GTPE like my friend got, but the rest kinda seem like normal 'first-run of a new model' issues.

FWIW, My friend doesn't care about the 5sec issue at all, he's not the type to floor it for longer than that, but he may be in the minority of GTPE owners in that regard.

Of the other issues I've seen here, inconsistent PAAK seems to bother people the most and Ford should probably focus on fixing that.

The unintended trunk popping seems like a safety issue though it doesn't seem wide spread, but that would be another thing i think they should focus on.

The rest of the issues honestly seem more annoying, but stuff people are able to live with and to be honest, all cars have those.

I have a musk mobile, (no brand loyalty, it just checked all my boxes) and there are small annoyances here and there too. No company is immune to them, what really matters is what they do about them.

From what I gather, Ford was pretty quick to come up with a solution to the HVBJB(might have the letters wrong, but you all know what I mean). They put out a software bandaid, then had a solution on how to remedy the issue. I'm not sure how well it went after that, but it seemed like they took it seriously and knew how to fix it.

I'm glad to see EVs becoming more mainstream and many models to choose from today. That's what Ford needs to realize... people have a lot more choices now. My friend didn't get a Model Y simply because he didn't want a Tesla (i didn't care about brand at all)... at the time there weren't many options so the MME was an easy choice for him. Today there are so many options so Ford really needs to address major issues as they occur or risk losing sales.

The Lightning seems awesome. I'm not a truck guy, but if I wanted a truck, that's the one I'd get.

 

[RickMachE]

The Mach-E is a patchwork quilt of wayward modules all trying to work together.

Which was known from the beginning. They stole from other models and did as little creating from new as possible to get to market. Was it a mistake? Not given what the competition was for the first 2 years IMO.

Sponsored