THE VIRGINIAN-PILOT
Copyright (c) 1995, Landmark Communications, Inc.
DATE: Sunday, October 1, 1995 TAG: 9509300299
SECTION: BUSINESS PAGE: D1 EDITION: FINAL
SOURCE: BY LON WAGNER, STAFF WRITER
LENGTH: Medium: 93 lines
Ford Motor Co. code named it PN96. And for more than a year its features, design, release date and cost were as closely guarded as a military secret.
Today, Ford formally rolls out the PN96 as its latest redesign of its F-150 pickup, the light truck that led F-series trucks to be the best-selling vehicles in the United States for the past 13 years.
The redesigned F-150 is a crucial product for both Ford and the 2,000 workers at its Norfolk Assembly Plant. F-series trucks generate billions of dollars yearly for Ford's coffers, and the 70-year-old Norfolk plant has been designated the lead plant for the launch of the new pickup.
The plant will begin churning out the new pickups in November. The 1997 model will be on display in showrooms beginning this January.
The new F-150 will have to retain its ``freshness'' for several years to compete with a V-8 pickup scheduled to be introduced by Toyota for the 1998 model year and a redesigned Chevy CK-series pickup the same year, auto industry experts say.
``This vehicle has got a lot to shoulder,'' says George Hoffer, an economics professor at Virginia Commonwealth University who follows the auto industry. ``It's got to be contemporary enough that by the end of the decade it fights the new GM and the new Toyota.''
A redesigned model has the potential to spike a company's sales. Chrysler had 7 percent of the light-truck market before redesigning its Ram pickup. Since redesigning the Ram in 1993, Chrysler's market share has jumped to 17 percent.
``Ford didn't like that, even though they're selling every truck they can make,'' said Jim Harbor, whose Troy, Mich., company Harbor & Associates studies industry trends.
For about eight months, Ford pickup buyers will be able to choose between the 1996 model - the outgoing style - and the 1997 redesign. Ford will keep building the 1996 models until August. The two models will differ significantly.
The 1997 F-150 has a more rounded look to improve its aerodynamics. Two of its more highly touted features are driver- and passenger-side airbags, which are standard features, and a third door that provides access to the rear seats.
Ford installed a deactivation switch for the passenger-side air bag. Tests have shown that if an airbag deploys with a child sitting in a safety seat on the passenger side, the child can be injured. The switch allows a driver to turn off the airbag if a child seat is in use.
Scores of other cosmetic and mechanical changes have been made to the F-150. The vehicle had not been fully redesigned since 1980. Production of F-series trucks - 574,000 through the third week in September - is up 12 percent from last year, Hoffer said. Two-thirds of the F-series trucks Ford sells are the F-150 model.
The rest of the F-series will be redesigned over the next two years. The F-250 will be the bedrock of a new four-door sport utility vehicle scheduled for late 1996. The F-350 and F-450 Fords will have new versions in 1998.
Clearly, the current version of the F-150 is popular with the public. But it wasn't always that way: When the F-150 went through its last major redesign in 1980, traditional pickup drivers complained about the changes. Even now, the 1979 Ford F-150 is considered ``the ultimate pickup truck in myth,'' much as the 1957 Chevy is considered the hallmark car of its era, Hoffer said.
The new F-150 is engineered with a more stylish look and smoother drive than the previous version. The company is trying to catch the eye of suburban car drivers while not putting off traditional light truck owners.
``This has been the dilemma for the pickup truck designers,'' Hoffer said, ``to make it retain its masculine, worklike look, and at the same time expand it's attractiveness.''
F-series trucks make up about 17 percent of Ford's sales. Ford makes about $4,000 profit per truck, Hoffer said. That profit contribution - the wholesale price minus the cost to make a truck - translates to about $3 billion a year, he says.
With all that is riding on the introduction of the new F-150, Ford has kept most of the redesign details under wraps. The company wouldn't allow media into the Norfolk plant to photograph the truck, although it did last week begin circulating pictures of the new F-150.
Workers at the Norfolk plant had hoped to show off the new model as early as last October when Gov. George F. Allen came to Norfolk to tout Ford's $290 million investment in a new body shop. Headquarters in Dearborn, Mich., squelched that introduction at the last minute, but plant managers gave Allen a peek after the media left.
Ford says it hasn't been any more secretive about the F-150 introduction than it is about any of its new models - but it may have been more successful.
``We've been better than every before about preventing the info from getting out,'' company spokesman David Reuter said. ``We haven't even had any spy shots taken during testing.''
Secrecy builds interest, but Harbor says there's another reason for it.
``There's a lot of '95s available,'' he said. ``The public will say, `Geez, that's beautiful - let's wait for the new one.' ''
That's a problem Ford would love to have. by CNB