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Ford is fighting against physics to build affordable EVs
(www.theverge.com)
Remember boys and girls, the Maverick was a small truck that started at $20,000. It is now $35,000. Base. They can do it, they just don't want to, and every time this concept comes up the price goes up. Next month they'll be talking about a "cheap" $40,000 truck.
To be fair I'd probably do the same thing if I saw people were willing to pay. Similar to the little scion FRS cars that were supposed to be cheap but dealers saw so many people wanted them they marked them up like crazy which defeated the whole point to me
The other option is to build and sell a ton of them. It's profitable even if the margin is smaller. Right now, the problem is the price of the Maverick is starting to run into the Ranger price range. Why make both? What the market told Ford is that an inexpensive vehicle has demand. Jacking up the price will kill that demand.
So weird how those same laws of physics do not exist in China.
Finally! Should have focused more on efficiencies ages ago, but the oil companies wanted more use, not less and looks were more important than gas mileage to customers in things like trucks. But since charging stations have been delayed to prop up oil profits, and so aren't as ubiquitous as gas stations, and battery tech (including fast charging) had been gobbled up and killed off for the last nearly a century by oil companies before cell phones needed it, EVs need that efficiency.
EVs are inherently very efficient. This is about making them cheap.
EVs are inherently cheaper that CE-based alternatives.
So unless this is about stopping the 24/7 propaganda of fossil fuel lobbyists, it's just some useless PR stunt.
It mentions things like reducing friction, enhancing aerodynamics, etc., which should have be applied to all cars long ago. There might be slight differences in what efficiencies apply since components are different, but a lot are shared like shape of the body shell, lots of components in the wheels, axles, transmissions, etc., that could have friction reduced, etc.
Why are they crediting Ford for 48V systems? This was adapted by Tesla in 2022 and they even shared the specs openly with other car makers to encourage them to switch.
Saves a massive amount of copper. Hundreds of miles less wire and much less complex harnesses.
Basically, Ford will be using Tesla manufacturing without the high Tesla markup.
this post was submitted on 18 Feb 2026
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