Thread for people who haven’t got their Lightning yet to be grumpy in

[bosox8]

It's truly staggering how @Ford Motor Company has screwed up the roll-out of this vehicle, in particular for the early Wave 1 and Wave 2 builds. Later waves seem to be rolling off the assembly line onto railcars and transport vehicles and into the waiting arms of their excited new owners while ours sit in various parking lots apparently being moved about now and then. Notifications are inconsistent and communications absolutely awful - it's like no one has a handle on this process. If I don't receive my truck which rolled off the assembly line 7 weeks ago within the next two weeks I can expect yet ANOTHER interest rate increase. My excitement for this vehicle is dampening as my cost of ownership keeps climbing with no end in sight.

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[aquapools]

It's truly staggering how @Ford Motor Company has screwed up the roll-out of this vehicle, in particular for the early Wave 1 and Wave 2 builds. Later waves seem to be rolling off the assembly line onto railcars and transport vehicles and into the waiting arms of their excited new owners while ours sit in various parking lots apparently being moved about now and then. Notifications are inconsistent and communications absolutely awful - it's like no one has a handle on this process. If I don't receive my truck which rolled off the assembly line 7 weeks ago within the next two weeks I can expect yet ANOTHER interest rate increase. My excitement for this vehicle is dampening as my cost of ownership keeps climbing with no end in sight.

Bosox, I am in Wave 3 and my truck rolled off the assembly line 14 weeks ago. By the time I receive the Lightning others will be getting the 23 models which pisses me off to no end. Nobody can even approximate when my truck will move to the Built Status let alone show it's been shipped. None of this makes any sense to let 99% built vehicles sit in Parking Lots while others Produced after mine are rolling down the process unencumbered.
TaxManHog do you have tidbits of good news...........................

 

[SmoothJ]

Mine seems to be stuck waiting to get on a train. Luckily, someone activated FordPass, so I was able to track the moments. That seems to ease my sanity a bit, however on the podcast with one of the Ford dealers, there was a person who has been waiting well over 3 weeks for his vehicle to go to the same destination as mine (the same train yard). This doesn't give me a good feeling.

I find myself hoping that when I wake up in the AM, I refresh my status page and see shipped, or even seeing an email from Ford saying the same.

 

[FlasherZ]

It's truly staggering how @Ford Motor Company has screwed up the roll-out of this vehicle, in particular for the early Wave 1 and Wave 2 builds. Later waves seem to be rolling off the assembly line onto railcars and transport vehicles and into the waiting arms of their excited new owners while ours sit in various parking lots apparently being moved about now and then. Notifications are inconsistent and communications absolutely awful - it's like no one has a handle on this process. If I don't receive my truck which rolled off the assembly line 7 weeks ago within the next two weeks I can expect yet ANOTHER interest rate increase. My excitement for this vehicle is dampening as my cost of ownership keeps climbing with no end in sight.

I've made mention of this in other threads, this is new product manufacturing; not just Ford. In fact, my own experience with Tesla 10 years ago was the same way. No timing promised, I got an unannounced e-mail early in 2012 asking me to configure the car for production later that year. Tesla launched the Model S to first customers in June 2012, I was part of the first 1,000 (and had paid a $40k deposit to be there). In August, I was on vacation when I got an e-mail that my car was being produced and that I needed to finalize paperwork - I updated it and signed the agreement that day... and then back to more waiting. Long story short, August led to September led to October, and suddenly people outside the first 1,000 were getting their cars before mine (evil peasants!!). It was frustrating, and you can probably find my complaint posts on the Tesla forums to this day if you dig far back enough. October led to November, when I complained to the President of the company via e-mail, and finally heard back. I learned that my car had failed a critical production quality test and had to be rebuilt from scratch. Eventually it was delivered end of November, 2012.

It was, unfortunately, the cost of being one of the very first - bugs are worked out during that phase and, while it sucks, none of us were promised a specific delivery date other than sometime during MY'22 when we placed our orders.

Manufacturing is an internal process. It's only been in the past 15 years that we've all grown accustomed to instant information available from formerly invisible processes. Now customers want hourly updates from assembly lines, powered by the computer systems that track all of it. Most manufacturing executives care about getting the build process right and the quality into the finished product, and updating the end customer on status falls much lower on their priority list. And the customer updates actually hurt the process, because if you communicate a "build week" to the customer, they're going to formulate some sort of delivery date expectations. In reality, all of us who have ordered are all going to get a MY'22 Ford F-150 Lightning (and some may be blessed by having an early MY'23, but we don't know that yet).

Having been through that before, I'm with you. I know your anxiousness, your desire to have the truck in your driveway. You can taste it, it's soooo close. And it'll be worth it when it does arrive. In the meantime, hang on! It'll be worth it!

 

[rlbussard]

I confirmed with the railyard that my vehicle did not arrive yesterday on the train. So that means I am still waiting to see when my vehicle is coming. I have been shipped since the 25th, but still nothing. I takes on 7 days from Dearborn to Mesquite, TX by rail. On top of that, the hold the put on the vehicle's first mis shipment to Mesquite is still there. So that means even if it arrives, I can't get the truck until someone at Ford remembers to remove the hold that is on the truck.

 

[PV2EV]

The last car I ordered (96 Z28 SS Camaro) took eight months. I have only purchased off the lot since then, until now. My Lightning at 3 months from order placement without an update is starting to look like a long journey.

I am telling myself the wait will just make my like it more

 

[VTbuckeye]

If interest rates were stable this would not be as bad. Build week 8/29, so I can't even think about locking in an interest rate with a local credit union. It is too soon to start the sales process for my Tacoma. If the economy goes to sh!t and interest rates keep going up, the cost of the lightning will get higher and the value of the Tacoma will go down. I don't mind planning things, but at some point you want to do something.

 

[SmoothJ]

The last car I ordered (96 Z28 SS Camaro) took eight months. I have only purchased off the lot since then, until now. My Lightning at 3 months from order placement without an update is starting to look like a long journey.

I am telling myself the wait will just make my like it more

I am in the same boat. I never custom ordered, and I always took what was locally at the dealer. If it didn't have an option, I just accepted it and moved on. However this time it was different as I just picked up a 21 F150 Lariat PowerBoost. I love the truck, but its missing something that I want (not a need) and its been driving me mad since.

So now I just need to wait "patiently" for my vehicle to be loaded, and the train to depart. I know its there... I see it. I just can't do anything about it. I just hope the next notification on my phone would be SecuriAlert saying a door has been opened.

 

[F150ROD]

The wait continues even when the Truck arrives locally it’s another 2-3 weeks before it’s shipped to the dealer. Some have it worse than others, it sucks and I can understand people losing enthusiasm. I am almost at the end of this journey but my excitement has gone diminished, especially just looking around what $80k can get me. Granted not an EV that I want.

 

[aquapools]

I've made mention of this in other threads, this is new product manufacturing; not just Ford. In fact, my own experience with Tesla 10 years ago was the same way. No timing promised, I got an unannounced e-mail early in 2012 asking me to configure the car for production later that year. Tesla launched the Model S to first customers in June 2012, I was part of the first 1,000 (and had paid a $40k deposit to be there). In August, I was on vacation when I got an e-mail that my car was being produced and that I needed to finalize paperwork - I updated it and signed the agreement that day... and then back to more waiting. Long story short, August led to September led to October, and suddenly people outside the first 1,000 were getting their cars before mine (evil peasants!!). It was frustrating, and you can probably find my complaint posts on the Tesla forums to this day if you dig far back enough. October led to November, when I complained to the President of the company via e-mail, and finally heard back. I learned that my car had failed a critical production quality test and had to be rebuilt from scratch. Eventually it was delivered end of November, 2012.

It was, unfortunately, the cost of being one of the very first - bugs are worked out during that phase and, while it sucks, none of us were promised a specific delivery date other than sometime during MY'22 when we placed our orders.

Manufacturing is an internal process. It's only been in the past 15 years that we've all grown accustomed to instant information available from formerly invisible processes. Now customers want hourly updates from assembly lines, powered by the computer systems that track all of it. Most manufacturing executives care about getting the build process right and the quality into the finished product, and updating the end customer on status falls much lower on their priority list. And the customer updates actually hurt the process, because if you communicate a "build week" to the customer, they're going to formulate some sort of delivery date expectations. In reality, all of us who have ordered are all going to get a MY'22 Ford F-150 Lightning (and some may be blessed by having an early MY'23, but we don't know that yet).

Having been through that before, I'm with you. I know your anxiousness, your desire to have the truck in your driveway. You can taste it, it's soooo close. And it'll be worth it when it does arrive. In the meantime, hang on! It'll be worth it!

Flasher Z here is your quote: And the customer updates actually hurt the process, because if you communicate a "build week" to the customer, they're going to formulate some sort of delivery date expectations.

Ford communicated a build week of May 9th and a Blend date of May 12th and then 55 days elapses. I certainly don't need hourly updates, but 55 days and no explanation is ridiculous. This is not the first rodeo for Ford and Farley openly admitted that they had all the batteries, chips etc., to build the first 15,000 Lightnings. So lets say my truck is missing one micro-chip. Does that mean that Ford will keep building new Lightnings while my truck and many others sit stagnant in a remote parking lot ? None of this crap makes any sense and I am not going to sit back and wait without a fight. Fair is fair and this is total bullshit.

 

[SmoothJ]

If I don't get on the train by 1600 hours today (Eastern), I will need to wait till 7/10

This isn't Fords issue per say either, its the New Boston Rail Yard. I know they can only do so much and maybe they are lacking people, but geez... Assuming it does get to Twin Oaks, PA - there is someone on this forum waiting for nearly 10 days for their vehicle at this point. We will see if it makes it to NJ by the 23rd... I'm not holding my breath though as its not even shipped.

 

[FlasherZ]

Flasher Z here is your quote: And the customer updates actually hurt the process, because if you communicate a "build week" to the customer, they're going to formulate some sort of delivery date expectations.

Ford communicated a build week of May 9th and a Blend date of May 12th and then 55 days elapses. I certainly don't need hourly updates, but 55 days and no explanation is ridiculous. This is not the first rodeo for Ford and Farley openly admitted that they had all the batteries, chips etc., to build the first 15,000 Lightnings. So lets say my truck is missing one micro-chip. Does that mean that Ford will keep building new Lightnings while my truck and many others sit stagnant in a remote parking lot ? None of this crap makes any sense and I am not going to sit back and wait without a fight. Fair is fair and this is total bullshit.

Your expectations are fairly new.

10 years ago, if you special-ordered a vehicle from pretty much anyone, you'd be told "typical lead times are <x>, but it can vary, we'll call you when it comes in". And they would. Calling the company, or the dealer, to scream at them for the lead time would net you "no updates, we'll call you when it comes in".

You were not promised "<x> days past your scheduled build week", or "<y> days past your order date", or even "delivery in order that orders were placed". When you ordered, you were promised a model-year 2022 Ford F-150 Lightning, regardless of where you were in the order line. And that doesn't even count the fact that technically, NONE of us is entitled to a truck because Ford's relationship is with dealers, but that's another matter.

It's human nature to be excited and to want to be "FIRST!" and to have more anxiety as you know progress is being made... but the reality is that you want to "fight" Ford and think it's "total bullshit" because they're not delivering to an expectation that only you created in your head based on extra information that Ford gave you! That's quite a bit unfair, IMO.

As I said, it's happened to me. I was pretty frustrated in the moment, I understand the anxiety. I even had $40k tied up in the transaction for more than a year, not the $500 that Ford needed. But in the end, the reality is that Ford never promised you that you'd have your truck by now.

So - to your question - the answer is "YES" when you ask "does that mean that Ford will keep building new Lightnings while my truck and many others sit?" They scheduled you early, but obviously something needs to be reworked with it, and that takes some special handling == time. And manufacturing isn't always fair - you stop the bleeding and fix go-forward before you go back and do re-work. Holding up new orders to ensure you rework all the older ones just compounds the problem. It is what it is - and it's why manufacturing is the way that it is. And the worst way to handle it is to do a full line stop until everything is reworked, then restart the line - because you have resources tied up in continuous operation.

The most unfair thing, in my opinion, is that there are people who reserved the truck in the first few moments of the reveal event who haven't even gotten the opportunity to order yet. Meanwhile, someone who reserved several months later got the opportunity because her dealer is in a ZEV state and got 40 allocations, and is prioritized because her husband works in sales at that dealership. Even then, Ford never promised that they'd go in order...

 

[FordLightningMan]

As a Wave 2er, I see people who were later waves built and complaining about their shipping delays... when I'm not even built yet. Basically what that means is I have my own bias, if a Wave 4 sits on a lot for four months, that is fine as long as Wave 1, 2, then 3 get out before Wave 4. However, I'm sure the Wave 4 person on the lot doesn't feel this same way.

When I have to pay 2% higher rates cause my Wave 2 order kept getting its build week moved back, that sucks. But for the Wave 3 guy already driving his truck, Ford was beyond successful!

I think I agree, if we knew less, the whole process would be better. What you don't know can't hurt you!

 

[Rekoil]

As a Wave 2er, I see people who were later waves built and complaining about their shipping delays... when I'm not even built yet. Basically what that means is I have my own bias, if a Wave 4 sits on a lot for four months, that is fine as long as Wave 1, 2, then 3 get out before Wave 4. However, I'm sure the Wave 4 person on the lot doesn't feel this same way.

When I have to pay 2% higher rates cause my Wave 2 order kept getting its build week moved back, that sucks. But for the Wave 3 guy already driving his truck, Ford was beyond successful!

I think I agree, if we knew less, the whole process would be better. What you don't know can't hurt you!

As another Wave 2'er with production 5/6(scheduled week of 5/2), I think something really got FUBAR'd on the early runs. Bad enough to where radio silence is preferable to the negative press it would have generated for Ford. The only other plausible explanation I can think up is total ineptness, which I find hard to believe for a company that has been doing this for over 100 years

Unfortunately, it's starting to seem clear, at least to me, that this mess is not going to be resolved anytime soon. Also, its pretty clear at this point that the lack of communication is a "strategic" decision by Ford.

 

[Rekoil]

Damn, that’s a distance away, but satellite shows other ford trucks in that lot whenever that was taken. Maybe you’re being prepped for shipping. There‘s a building for something.
‘how many miles on odometer?

Moved again, maybe they are hitting up Roush for some upgrades Now up to 40 mi on the odometer: