- Ford is getting ready to launch its Common Electrical Car platform, its next-gen EV structure.
- The primary mannequin on the platform can be a mid-size electrical truck with a beginning value round $30,000.
- It’s going to have a 400-volt battery, a 48-volt energy system, a real software-defined structure and an LFP battery.
Ford wants an electric-vehicle reset.
Its try to personal the EV truck market, the unique Ford F-150 Lighting, led to that mannequin’s cancellation amid considerations over its excessive value, poor towing efficiency and persistent unprofitability. And whereas the Mustang Mach-E electrical crossover has bought in excessive volumes, it alone cannot be some EV takeoff level as Ford’s personal CEO repeatedly sounds the alarm concerning the risk to its enterprise from Chinese language newcomers.
However Ford says all of these classes will add as much as make this, the upcoming Common Electrical Car (UEV) platform. It is set to launch in 2027 with a midsize truck that is mentioned to start out round $30,000 however nonetheless affords the options trendy EV customers need, like a frunk, plenty of passenger area, stable vary and efficiency and cutting-edge software program.
If Ford’s warnings about China Inc. are to be taken severely, then the UEV had higher work, particularly because the automaker is now dialing again most of its different EV plans. However in a media briefing final week, Ford executives launched extra particulars concerning the truck, the platform, and their efforts to cross value financial savings onto prospects whereas lastly delivering an EV that is worthwhile, too. Here is what we all know.
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Supply: Ford
The Thought: Begin With A Truck, Make It Slippery
Ford began with a good suggestion. American shoppers love vans, so kicking off electrification plans with an all-electric pickup sounded sensible, executives and engineers mentioned.
It’s, however provided that Ford can provide one thing higher than what patrons can get on the internal-combustion market. The F-150 Lightning struggled with that, because it regarded and felt loads like a gasoline truck, however with a a lot increased price ticket and fewer endurance.
Ford says it isn’t making that mistake once more. The corporate is launching its moonshot EV platform with what’s successfully a battery-powered equal to the massively standard Ford Maverick. Truck followers could bluster at calling such a car a “truck,” because the Maverick’s car-based platform and softer form is much less brutish than conventional F-150s and Rangers. However the Maverick’s reputation speaks for itself.
Anticipate the UEV truck to blur the road additional, as Ford says ultra-slippery aerodynamics had been essential to this program.
Some design sketches of the UEV truck.
Picture by: Ford
Batteries nonetheless account for the biggest proportion of manufacturing prices, so decreasing the truck’s coefficient of drag and frontal space had been high priorities. In different phrases, if engineers could not pare again the battery with out impacting their vary objectives, they needed to increase vary by decreasing aerodynamic drag. That meant remodeling a design consistently with fast prototyping and new elements, chasing tiny adjustments that added as much as severe adjustments.
Ford says its system of “bounties” that assigned direct battery-cost estimates to each determination helped engineers internalize this basic shift.
But when folks already query whether or not the Maverick is a truck, anticipate an analogous information cycle for this factor after we see the ultimate design. Something 15% extra slippery than a Maverick is sure to have mushy edges and a few attention-grabbing bodywork smoothing airflow round and over the mattress.
Ford says it’s going to nonetheless have the usability of a compact truck, however primarily based on the restricted silhouette photos the corporate launched, it might not look fairly like one.
‘The Finest Half Is No Half’
Ford says consolidating the facility mirror and folding capabilities into one central motor is sweet for an additional 1.5 miles of vary.
Picture by: Ford
After which there was the Tesla-esque strategy championed by veterans of that firm tapped for the venture, like Alan Clarke, now Ford’s government director of superior car improvement. One frequent Tesla-ism at work: The most effective half is not any half. The second-best half is one which serves a number of capabilities.
As one instance, Ford factors to the truck’s mirrors, which use the identical motor for energy folding as they do for adjustment. This allowed them to scale back the dimensions of the mirror by over 20%.
That alone is sweet for 1.5 miles of vary, Ford claims. The corporate additionally says the Maverick-sized truck can be 15% extra aerodynamically environment friendly than the following best truck design on sale, which is, naturally, the Maverick.
Use Software program To Save Cash
If you happen to learn these pages typically, you understand that the race to create true software-defined autos is as messy and essential because the race to create inexpensive EVs. In actual fact, as Clarke instructed me, you want the previous if you’d like the latter. Shoppers could not care concerning the nuts and bolts of a real software-defined structure versus a historically designed car, however they’re going to care about the advantages.
“An important factor they get [from a software-defined vehicle] is low value,” Clarke instructed me. “That is what they’ll see. There’s much less car content material that they do not care about, in order that we will put more cash into the car content material that they do care about.”
Whereas conventional automobiles typically have dozens of digital management models (ECUs) that do not or cannot speak to at least one one other, with software program written by suppliers, SDVs from corporations like Tesla and Rivian use centralized computing programs, with high-speed communication between totally different nodes. They management each little bit of software program within the automotive, making it simpler to improve issues over the air or use the identical sensor for a number of capabilities.
Alan Clarke, an Apple vet, is main Ford’s next-gen EV venture.
Picture by: Ford
For an organization like Ford, which has many years of expertise doing issues the previous method, it was pure to go that route with its first few EVs. However slicing out all of these ECUs and the entire redundant wiring concerned saves some huge cash, and proudly owning the software program provides you much more flexibility to supply the snappy, intuitive tech options shoppers anticipate.
It strikes the complexity from the {hardware} realm, the place it’s essential to perceive the constraints of a dozen totally different wholly constructed ECUs, to the software program realm. There, engineers might add interconnections that will by no means exist in a hardware-defined system. Within the UEV platform, the entire difficult software program interactions are processed on native controllers, or on domain-specific nerve facilities just like the “E-Field,” which mixes the entire energy management and charging {hardware} into one place.
So the UEV platform is a real SDV, by means of and thru. Ford owns the entire software program, Clarke mentioned, and has a degree of upgradeability and management extra on par with a Tesla or Chinese language EV than a conventional Ford product.
“I believe finally, that is primary, is they’ll see a low-cost car, however the second is that they’ll see that it isn’t stripped down, and that there is a complete bunch of function content material,” he mentioned. “As a result of it is a software-defined car, it’ll proceed to get higher over time, with extra function content material and extra functionality for his or her car.”
Picture by: Ford
Supply Over-the-Air Updates, However For Actual This Time
If you happen to personal an EV from a legacy model, likelihood is you had been instructed whenever you purchased it that it was “succesful” of over-the-air updates. This is true in a literal sense, however the significance and cadence of updates for many of them have been abysmal. When new options are added, they’re typically added one mannequin at a time, whereas Tesla, Rivian and the like push broad, vehicle-wide updates to their total fleets with regularity.
There are two principal causes for this: First, many automakers’ EVs could have frequent elements, however the lack of end-to-end commonality means updates occur in a piecemeal trend. I’ve skilled this myself: When Common Motors added video streaming apps to a few of its EVs, it took practically a 12 months to achieve others, and nonetheless is not on each automotive. Ford says this can be solved by a real frequent software program platform on the UEV platform, which is able to underpin as much as eight totally different autos.
The second concern is what Charles Poon, Ford’s vice chairman for car {hardware}, calls “folks putty.” As a result of Ford does not management all the software program stack on autos just like the F-150 Lightning and Mach-E, pushing an replace requires direct communication between people at a wide range of suppliers.
“So we now have ‘folks putty’ that glues collectively all these varied interfaces,” Poon mentioned. “As a result of, actually, we want folks to speak amongst folks due to these, these huge, complicated interfaces. Alan’s workforce does not want these. All they’re targeted on is simply useful execution.”
Picture by: Ford
Use LFP Batteries, Made In America
Anybody who follows the Chinese language EV business is aware of one battery chemistry dominates there: Lithium-iron phosphate, or LFP. Whereas the nickel cobalt manganese (NCM) or nickel cobalt manganese aluminum (NCMA) batteries that dominate Western provide chains are extra vitality dense, LFP cells are cheaper, extra secure, last more and require fewer treasured supplies. Ford will use this chemistry for the UEV platform, and claims that its LFP cells must be the most cost effective in America.
Selecting 400, Not 800 Volts
Many automakers are transitioning to extra superior 800-volt architectures for his or her next-generation EVs. Not Ford. Whereas 800-volt programs provide some effectivity and weight-saving benefits, their principal profit is ultra-fast charging speeds. Clarke says that Ford thought of an 800-volt system, however charging velocity is not the principle precedence right here; value is.
“If you happen to had been to go to 800 volts, the price could be, like, 20% increased, proper? Simply because it’s important to, like, shrink the dimensions of the cells by half, proper, to have the ability to accomplish what it’s essential to accomplish,” Poon mentioned. “In order that’s why, on this explicit case, we actually need to deal with affordability with no compromises. The 400-volt system delivers that.”
Improve The Electronics & ADAS
Ford wished the most cost effective potential battery for the automotive, which is why an 800-volt system was off the desk. However that does not imply the corporate is doing electronics the old style method. Most automobiles use a 12-volt system to energy low-voltage electronics, just like the screens, driver help capabilities and equipment.
However the UEV platform will use Ford’s first 48-volt system, which permits the corporate to scale back wiring prices, improve effectivity and provide extra energy to crucial elements, just like the automated driving help system. That is essential, as Ford says the UEV platform will ultimately provide eyes-off autonomous driving.
Ford has not mentioned the way it plans to realize that, nonetheless, or if the UEV merchandise will use lidar or not. And a number of other automakers have pushed again their most bold autonomy objectives currently. Till we all know extra, that promise could also be greatest with a grain of salt.
Use The Battery As The Ground
The UEV platform can even use Ford’s first structural battery. Whereas Clarke stopped in need of calling it cell-to-body, because the cells are nonetheless in a definite pack, the seats and inside elements bolt straight onto the pack. There is no extra separation between ground and pack, which allowed Ford to provide the UEV a decrease roofline. That helps ship the supposed impact: higher aero, extra vary, no enormous battery required.
The seats in UEV-platform autos bolt immediately onto the pack, which can also be the ground of the car.
Picture by: Ford
Lastly: A Systematic Method
The most important takeaway, then, is how interconnected all of those previously separate fiefdoms are within the electrical age. The standard automotive design course of was very silo’d, with conflicting pursuits preventing to seek out the perfect compromise. However lately, Ford engineers mentioned, making a world-class EV means all the system have to be optimized round minimizing vitality utilization to maximise effectivity and slicing battery prices.
However the proof finally is not in massive speak—it is in constructing an EV that pairs world-class effectivity with wonderful software program and a can’t-beat value. We’ll discover out subsequent 12 months if Ford can ship.
Contact the writer: Mack.Hogan@insideevs.com.
