This is an announcement that Ford could have done without.
The automaker said in early March that it would resume production of its much-watched F-150 Lightning pickup truck, the electric version of the iconic F-150. This resumption of production came after a month of interruption, due to a fire related to the battery.
During a standard quality check on Feb. 4, one of the F-150 Lightning in a holding lot displayed a battery issue and caught fire while the vehicle was charging. The root cause identified was related to the battery cell production at the SK On plant in Georgia, the company said. Ford didn't disclose what caused the fire.
SK On is Ford's battery supplier.
"As part of our pre-delivery quality inspections, a vehicle displayed a potential battery issue and we are holding vehicles while we investigate," the company explained at the time. "We are suspending production at the Rouge Electric Vehicle Center through at least the end of next week."
Ford Recalls 18 F-150 Lightning
At the beginning of March, the Dearborn, Mich.-based company announced that production would resume on March 13, i.e. in two days.
"We will restart production at the Rouge Electric Vehicle Center on March 13," a spokesperson said at the time in an emailed statement, referring to the Michigan plant where the pickup truck is manufactured.
Ford (F) wanted to give enough time to its battery supplier, SK On, to build up production and deliver battery packs to the Lightning production line in Michigan.
But a few days before the resumption of production, Ford has just announced the recall of the F-150 Lightning, because of a defect in the battery cell.
"Ford is recalling 18 F-150 Lightnings due to a battery cell manufacturing defect, which occurred over a four-week period starting at the end of last year," a spokeswoman said in an emailed statement. "We recently established that 18 vehicles containing cells from that four-week period had made it to dealers and customers."
The carmaker said that it is not aware of any reports of accident or injury related to this recall.
"Together with SK On, we have confirmed the root causes and have implemented quality actions," the spokesperson said without providing additional details.
Production Will Resume on March 13
The spokeswoman assured that production of the F-150 Lightning would resume on March 13.
"Production is on track to resume Monday with clean stock of battery packs," she asserted.
This vehicle, the first pickup truck aimed at a mass market due to its price, is being watched closely in the industry, to see if EV adoption beyond affluent consumers is possible. Ford had more than 200,000 orders before last month's incident. When the automaker will be able to fill these orders and meet this demand is difficult to estimate.
The production of the F-150 Lightning started last year. The vehicle is being manufactured in small numbers, between 2,000 and 2,400 units per month.
Ford, which also produces the electric sport utility vehicle Mustang Mach-E and the E-Transit, said on March 2 that it sold just 1,336 units last month, bringing the total to 3,600 vehicles this year.
In all, Ford has delivered 19,217 F-150 Lightning vehicles to its customers. .
The F-150 Lightning pickup truck is one of the few advantages that the brand, with the Blue Oval mega campus, has over Tesla (TSLA). Elon Musk's group is not currently present in the electric pickup truck segment; its first model in this profitable space is expected later this year. That's the Cybertruck, a vehicle with its unique futuristic design.
