Ford is pausing F-150 production at its Dearborn Truck plant for at least the next few days, as it deals with a broken hood die at a nearby stamping plant. The line ground to a halt the evening of May 21, and it’s expected to be down May 22, 23, and possibly 24, according to two people with knowledge of the situation who weren’t authorized to share the information publicly.
For those who don’t know, a hood die is a heavy-duty industrial mold used in a press to stamp and shape flat sheets of metal (in this case, aluminum) into the outer or inner panels of a vehicle’s hood.
An issue like this is a big problem for Ford, which is already dealing with incredibly tight F-150 inventory. Last fall, two fires at its main aluminum supplier in Oswego, New York, marred aluminum availability for the automaker, forcing it to look elsewhere while cutting production for some time. Ford has been working with the supplier to get things back in order, but it could take until later this year for F-150 inventory to stabilize. From the Detroit Free Press:
According to people familiar with the plant, Ford has been running two 10-hour shifts a day at the factory and builds about 1,000 pickups across those shifts. That means a shutdown for this length of time could result in a loss of about 2,500 or more pickups.
That normally wouldn’t be too serious except for the fact that Ford leaders told investors last month the automaker is about 60,000 units short in inventory compared to the year-ago period. Ford has been scrambling to run as much production as possible to make up the inventory shortfall.
“They’re already running all that they can to make it up and they have time to make it all up,” said one of the people. “They do super Saturdays and volunteer overtime so they’ll make it up. We’ve never not made it up.”
A “super Saturday” or “super Sunday” is when the carmaker runs an extra shift outside of the normal schedule so as to catch up on any lost production.
Ford dealers have told the Detroit Free Press they are worried about losing truck sales due to carrying thin inventory of the popular pickups, adding that the vehicles are dribbling out of the factories. Ford also makes the F-150 at its Kansas City Assembly Plant in Claycomo, Missouri.
Earlier this year, Ford announced its plan to add 50,000 F-Series pickups to its inventory in 2026. Some of those measures included speeding up the Kentucky Truck line, hiring 100 new employees at that facility, adding a third shift at Dearborn, starting Super Duty production in Canada, and skipping a summer shutdown to help make up the difference.
While this latest issue at Dearborn is only temporary, Ford can hardly afford any setbacks right now.
