Ford windshield wiper recall. $4B battery plant coming to Canada, and more, recent automotive news.

The microchip shortage drags on.  Honda, Toyota, and VW are just the lasted to announce more cutting in production. VW’s CFO recently stated that he thinks the microchip shortage will grind on until 2024. It seems like the only constant lately in manufacturers’ timeframes is further delays. 

GM moved their fleet order dates back for 2023 MY light-duty and heavy-duty trucks. The order banks were supposed to open yesterday morning for fleet orders.  We have been running around like crazy to get all of our customers’ orders together to place with GM.  Less than 24 hours before the order banks were scheduled to open we received an email from GM Fleet stating order dates have moved back to 5/26/2022. This is a 5-week delay with a 24-hour notice.  I have a feeling GM knew long ago that they were not going to meet this deadline but they have little regard for their customers’ time and the amount of work wasted by dealerships. As of now, GM had stated that the production dates for these trucks have not moved back from their previously announced time in July.  If these last few years have taught us anything, it is don’t catch your eggs until they hatch as the auto manufacturers have the ability to pull the rug out from all of us with little to no notice. 

Ford recalls over 650,000 pick and SUV windshield wipers that might break upon use. 2020-2021 F-150 Pickups and F-550 Pickups along with 2020-2021 Lincoln Navigator SUVs are the affected vehicles. The NHTSA submitted a report last week stating that the part is not within the specifications needed for higher torque wiper motors. Ford had stated that they used a motor with higher torque ratings on these vehicles due to the supply of their regular motors being short. It looks like customers will not be notified until May 23rd. I have no idea why they are having such a long delay on something that seems kind of dangerous.  If you have one of the affected models and years of vehicles, check to see if your wipers are acting erratically or seem to be moving slow. If so, I would replace your blades immediately as I would not want to have a wiper fly off my vehicle when I am going 60 down the highway in a rainstorm.

Stellantis joins forces with LG to create an almost $4B battery production plant in Windsor Ontario.  This will be Canada’s first large-scale battery plant and the Mayor of Windsor, Drew Dilkens said “I describe this as being as big as the transformation from the horseless carriage to the internal-combustion engine.” This plant is expected to employ around 3,200 people at the 4.5M square feet facility they will be building. This will make the plant one of the largest in North America. LG has also broke ground in Mexico recently in a joint venture with Magna to produce inverters, motors, and onboard chargers for GM’s new electric vehicle lineup coming down the pipeline.

Toyota is making a $383M investment into 4 NA plants to prepare to produce a new 4-cylinder engine. The plant affected are Alabama, Missouri, Kentucky, and Tennessee. Although Toyota has not released the details of their new engine, other sources have stated the engine will have a new block and a new head design.