Aluminum bodywork
- Thread starter zenriddles
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I've owned more than a dozen gen 3 SHO's and the trunk lids had a cancer problem to be sure. But they were not really subject to rock chips and certainly outlasted the rear quarter panels on every single car.
I'm also curious as to what bodywork is like on aluminum as compared to steel. Never tried it. Have no clue. How is the prep and separation of contaminated metal dealt with?
its gonna be a bitch.
fasteners and J/speed nuts are still steel, still scratch through coatings, and youll still have galvanic corrosion.
spider corrosion under paint more than steel's rings of corrosion under the paint.
in 10 years instead of rust spots all over the panel....all the fastening points will be large holes of white powder.
buying used is gonna get you a PDR/accident victim with craploads more potential corrosion issues due to fasteners no longer having any chromate coatings on the threads/underhead
plus no mater what aluminum work hardens significantly around bend points, which leads to tiny surface cracks, those will propagate and like the old fischer trim work....youll be able to remove it....but you may not be able to reinstall it...perhaps, with washers and glue.
the rust belt trucks will be horrible
fasteners and J/speed nuts are still steel, still scratch through coatings, and youll still have galvanic corrosion.
spider corrosion under paint more than steel's rings of corrosion under the paint.
in 10 years instead of rust spots all over the panel....all the fastening points will be large holes of white powder.
buying used is gonna get you a PDR/accident victim with craploads more potential corrosion issues due to fasteners no longer having any chromate coatings on the threads/underhead
plus no mater what aluminum work hardens significantly around bend points, which leads to tiny surface cracks, those will propagate and like the old fischer trim work....youll be able to remove it....but you may not be able to reinstall it...perhaps, with washers and glue.
the rust belt trucks will be horrible
I love you James but Ford isn't blazing any new ground with aluminum and since we don't see this on other manufacturers there's no real reason to expect to see it with Fords.
Body guys told me with the A8 that it's just a matter of having completely separate tools for the aluminum cars and training to deal with aluminum. For that reason it's still more expensive to have an aluminum car fixed and thus more expensive to insure an aluminum car. I suspect we'll see the insurance rates for the 2015 F150's going up.
Just did a cross comparison quote from my agent (progressive) since I'm in the process of purchasing a '15 and the only pricing adjustment is merely age of vehicle (2014 v 2015). Perhaps it'll take a bit for them to realize the additional cost of repair?
....ram ecodiesel ftw
Mulally will leave ford with an all aluminum headache just like he left Boeing with a problem-ridden 787. He forced the f150 through before they were ready just like he did with boeing.
I'm excited to see how it plays out
....ram ecodiesel ftw
Mulally will leave ford with an all aluminum headache just like he left Boeing with a problem-ridden 787. He forced the f150 through before they were ready just like he did with boeing.
I'm excited to see how it plays out
LOL WUT.
The 787 is McNerney's problem, if you feel like blaming the brass. Mulally left to helm FoMoCo before the 787 went into production. He oversaw concept and preproduction.
It's completely new ground to Ford; they've had a hard enough time transitioning to aluminum on single body panels (hood, decklid, w/e). The first years always have corrosion issues.
Swapping over an entire truck body (which involves overhauling entire assembly plants) is a HUGE undertaking. Paint adhesion, robotics, stamping, welding machines, everything has to be redone. I suppose it's possible to get everything 100% correct, but I wouldn't bet my money on it.
The facts that the insurance market doesn't yet know how to react is a given. The fact that they spent all this money (to be passed on to the customer) and took all this risk to still get worse fuel economy than their competition is also a given
They're getting worse fuel economy than their competitors because they didn't want to push the 10spd into production too early. Fuckin' CEO's not rushing the whole damn farm!
edit: and whose to say the weight loss was all about fuel economy? Is payload something no one gives a shit about anymore?
edit: and whose to say the weight loss was all about fuel economy? Is payload something no one gives a shit about anymore?
So none of the mistakes made, such as the decision to use lithium ion batteries, go back to concept and pre-production stages? IMO the blame for all of the problems with the 787 should be split between both CEO's, but I don't have first hand knowledge so that's just an opinion
If you leave before it moves into production, how are you accountable for what your team did or did not take into consideration?
Aside conversations i've had with engineers that work at Ford, nope. As I said earlier though, Ford doesn't exactly have a stellar reputation when it comes to corrosion on aluminum panels
You seem to be working with some bias here. I don't care that the F150 doesn't have the best fuel economy. In fact, I wasn't even aware. It has the best overall powertrain in the Ecoboost though and when you look at the whole picture I think it's objectively the best truck made.
Time will tell on the aluminum. Audi and other luxury manufacturers have the luxury of over-engineering this stuff since they're not pinching pennies. Ford, GM and the likes not so much and you still have to compete on price. So you guys might be entirely right. I tend to think Ford takes the F150 really seriously though and wouldn't mail it in on that like they used to do on their cars.
wait what
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