Ford sold nearly a million F-Series pickups in 2019 alone, generating $42 billion in sales. Those are astounding numbers indeed, and were enough to make the Ford F-Series the second-best selling consumer product in the U.S., behind only the Apple iPhone. To meet that sort of demand, the Ford Dearborn Truck Plant and Kansas City Assembly Plant, where the Ford F-150 is produced, must obviously be very efficient. And they most certainly are.
In fact, the Ford Dearborn Truck Plant gives birth to an F-150 every 52 seconds, Ford’s chief manufacturing and labor affairs officer, Gary Johnson, told Ford Authority executive editor, Alex Luft, in a recent interview. This doesn’t mean that it takes less than a minute to assemble a pickup, but it is an interesting data point, nonetheless. And it speaks to just how far automotive manufacturing has come since the days when Henry Ford was piecing together his first assembly line.
Production of the all-new 2021 Ford F-150 is currently underway at the Ford Dearborn Truck Plant, and the 14th generation pickup is scheduled to begin arriving at dealers this month. When it launches, customers will be treated to an entirely new version of Ford’s venerable pickup, as every panel of the 2021 F-150 has been redesigned.
Construction of the new Ford Rouge Electric Vehicle Center, where the electric F-150 will be built, is currently underway adjacent to the Dearborn Truck Plant as well. When it is completed in the summer of 2021, the new plant will be Ford’s most advanced facility in the world, utilizing technology such as self-driving transport sleds to transport electric F-150 bodies from one station to the next at the new Electric Vehicle Center. The EV truck’s body and paintwork will still be completed alongside ICE-powered F-150 models, however.
The new manufacturing center at the Dearborn-based Rouge Center, once complete, will add 300 jobs and is part of a $700 million investment in building the all-new 2021 Ford F-150 lineup, including the first-ever F-150 PowerBoost hybrid. The new jobs will support battery assembly and production of the F-150 PowerBoost hybrid and fully electric F-150.
We’ll have much more on Ford’s production processes soon, so be sure and subscribe to Ford Authority for the latest Ford F-Series news, Ford F-150 news, and continuous Ford news coverage.
Comments
Ford found the magic formulae many years ago…and astoundingly has managed to keep it going! I wish they could do this for more than a few of their lines…
This is a pretty common takt time for automotive, nothing special. I want to say GM Fort Wayne was actually in the 45 second range but it’s been awhile since I heard that number so I don’t know if that’s right. Regardless, their truck plants are pretty similar. They both have 3 major North American truck plants, and make pretty similar volumes out of them. The biggest difference is Ford has 2 plants for half tons and a dedicated Super Duty plant, where GM runs all models through all 3 plants, but they all have different sets of cab configurations they are able to make.
Great information! Glad to see the F 150 rolling off. How about doing a piece on the Bronco Sport rolling off the assembly line in Mexico?
That efficiency didn’t keep my 2018 F-150 5.0 v8 from eating its own cylinder liners before 30,000 miles, nor did it stop my 2019 F-150 3.5 EcoBoost from tearing apart its 10 speed transmission before 12,000 miles. I’m a Japanese made, Toyota owner now. Fool me once….
I have always been a Ford fan, but lately that has changed, maybe if the spent more time on quality instead of quantity, then at least half of what went out the door didn’t return in recalls.
I couldn’t get past the title to read the article because the title itself warrants a comment. Giving birth to a truck every 52 seconds makes Ford sound very stretched out. That’s like throwing a hotdog down a hallway.
One F150 every 52 seconds, this explains why millions of these vehicles have been recalled since the 2012 model year.