On Fri, 30 Aug 2002 08:16:40 -0700 josh <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> writes:
> http://biz.yahoo.com/rb/020830/autos_ford_think_2.html
>
> Reuters Business Report
> Ford Ending Investment in Electric Car
> Friday August 30, 9:49 am ET
>
> DETROIT (Reuters) - Ford Motor Co. (NYSE:F - News) on Friday
> said it was pulling the plug on its Think electric vehicle division
> due to poor customer demand and lack of government support
> for the environmentally friendly cars.
>
> Ford, which bought Norway-based Think in 1999 for $23 million
> and invested $100 million in electric vehicle battery technology,
> will instead focus on developing fuel cell and hybrid gasoline-
> electric vehicles to meet environmental regulations for cars and
> trucks, spokesman Tim Holmes told Reuters.
>
> "The bottom line is we don't believe that this is the future of
> environmental transport for the mass market," Holmes said . . . .
--
Dear Josh,
Holy Cow! And yet, I am not entirely
surprised, either. Last Xmas, we happened
to be visiting La Jolla, and on the way up the
coast to visit relatives in LA, we stopped off
in Carlsbad just to see what the TH!NK facility
looked like.
The rather ordinary-looking two-story silver
office building with a "TH!NK" sign on the
second floor seemed strangely out of place
in an office park and was, of course, deserted
for the holidays. But what struck me was a
big "For Lease" sign in front of the building,
listing a real estate management company.
I don't recall how many square feet they
were advertising, but it appeared to be the
entire building.
I sent a note to Bill Moore at EV World
the next day, suggesting that there might
be a story there. Bill called John Wallace,
head of TH!NK, who denied that there were
any problems or reductions in the TH!NK
program and gave the excuse that they were
just "subletting" some unused space on the
2nd floor, or something like that. It did not
sit right with me, because the amount of
space offered was quite large and seemed
to me to represent the entire building. (Why
did Ford lease all that space to begin with?)
During that trip I happened to visit a
Ford dealership in LA where a friend of
mine was having his TH!NK City in for
maintenance after his mileage dropped
and he got warning messages on the
dash at about 2700 miles on the odo.
There were *4 technicians* working
on the car when we got there, including
two factory reps (one of whom I recog-
nized,) and they were having a HELL of
a time figuring out what was wrong with
the car. This, despite the fact that they
were using a custom "OBD-2" type
diagnostic tool designed just for the
TH!NK.
To make a long story short, I discovered
that there had been *lots* of problems with
the NiCad Euro TH!NKs, possibly related
to the Battery Management System, and
that even in the best of circumstances,
these cars required the battery equivalent
of a major oil change and tune up every
3,000 miles! (Batteries flushed, refilled
with deionized tap water and run through
a lengthy charge-discharge procedure
that could take up to 2 days.)
My friend, Dennis' TH!NK was kept in the
Ford shop for *3 weeks*, during which he
was NOT given a loaner. They finally "fixed"
it by borrowing a battery pack from another
TH!NK.
We knew the long-anticipated "US version"
of the City was supposed to have a different
battery type -- speculation centering on sealed
PbA (Lead-Acid) -- but the factory techs refused
to answer any questions about this. (Not a good
sign, in retrospect.) I also knew that the City's
steel chassis was fairly heavy compared to the
Toyota ecom or Nissan Hypermini (which use
NiMH and Lithium-Ion respectively as well as
aluminum and other light weight chassis and
body materials) and that a PbA pack would
represent added weight, reduced range and
performance, and poorer ride quality (which
was never a strong suite for the TH!NK to
begin with!)
Recent announcements of delays in production
due to "battery related problems" seemed to
confirm my suspicions. And now this.
The real question that this begs is, "Will CARB
ever get tough with these auto manufacturers and
start handing out fines for noncompliance, or is
CARB only a *paper tiger*?" Ford is now betting
with GM and DaimlerChrysler -- who are doing their
worst to make a bonfire of the ZEV regulations in
the court system -- that Sacramento is a town built
out of *paper mache*, and that sooner or later this
will all go up in smoke.
Regards,
Dave Goldstein
President, EVA/DC and
Program Development Associates
Gaithersburg, MD 20879
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