Aussie Ford Ranger enters US production

It’s not often an Australian designed and engineered vehicle goes into production in North America – the world’s second largest automotive market.

Indeed, while Ford Australia invented the coupe utility in 1934, the Ford Ranger this week became the first Aussie-developed ute to enter production in the US – the world’s biggest pick-up market.

Due on sale across the US from early next year, the 2019 Ford Ranger was developed by the Blue Oval’s Asia Pacific Product Development team primarily at Broadmeadows and Geelong in Victoria.

Underpinned by the same T6 ladder frame that will form the basis of Ford’s born-again Bronco SUV in 2020, the Ranger last year became Ford Australia’s top-selling model and the nation’s most popular 4x4 pick-up.

In North American showrooms, it will join the F Series – the best-selling new vehicle in the US since 1986, the best-selling pick-up in the US since 1977 and Ford’s most lucrative model globally, generation more than $US40 billion of annual revenue in 2017, when almost 900,000 were sold.

Ford of America’s sales targets for the Ranger, which is now sold in more than 200 markets including China, have not been revealed but they will be more modest.

However, the Ranger – Ford’s flagship model in the Asia Pacific region, where it found 134,000 buyers in 2017, and the best-selling vehicle bar none in New Zealand, Taiwan, Vietnam and Thailand, where it is built for Australia -- will be a key player in the booming mid-size US pick-up market alongside strong-selling models like the Toyota Tacoma (HiLux).

To mark the start of US Ranger production for the first time since 2011 – the same year the current PX Ranger was launched as the first global pick-up under the One Ford strategy – Ford invited more than 3000 employees from its refurbished Michigan Assembly Plant to drive it at an off-road course created on the facility’s carpark for the occasion on Monday.

Ford has invested $US850 million in retooling to produce the Ranger at the Detroit factory that previously manufactured the Focus, which will be axed along with all of Ford’s other sedans as part of its plan to replace 75 per cent of its US portfolio by 2020.

Ford will also produce the Bronco on the Aussie-developed T6 platform at the Michigan Assembly Plant, but reportedly will not release a Ranger Raptor for the US market.

This is despite the Ranger Raptor now being available across the Asia Pacific region, as well as Europe, where Ranger has been the top-selling pick-up since 2015, and South Africa, which supplies the European Ranger.

Ford’s US Ranger is near identical to the Asia Pacific model, except for components like a steel lower front bumper, tray-integrated rear sports bar, sliding glass rear window and four-wheel disc brakes as seen on the Raptor.

Significantly, unlike Australia’s Ranger, which is available exclusively with diesel power, the US Ranger will launch only with a 2.3-liter turbo-petrol four-cylinder EcoBoost engine as seen in the Ford Mustang and Focus RS, matched with the same 10-speed automatic transmission found in the Ranger Raptor.

Other standard features will include Pre-Collision Assist with Automatic Emergency Braking (standard only in Australia’s top-shelf Ranger Wildtrak), although Blind Spot Information System and SYNC3 infotainment with Apple CarPlay and Android Auto will be optional.

Also optional on the US Ranger will be the FX4 Off-Road Package including Terrain Management System selectable drive modes from the Ranger Raptor, plus a new Trail Control system.

Ford of America claims the Ranger will deliver class-leading driver-assist technologies, connectivity features, payload and, for a mid-size petrol pick-up, towing and torque.

Speaking at the special celebration to mark the start of Ranger production, Ford’s president of global operations Joe Hinrichs told plant employees, media, United Auto Workers representatives and invited VIPs:

“Ford truck fans demanded a mid-size pick-up that’s ‘Built Ford Tough’ and we’re delivering with our all-new Ranger that’s specially designed and engineered for American truck customers.

“At the same time, we’re revitalising our Michigan Assembly Plant and securing good-paying jobs for our hourly employees here in the US.”

First opened to build Ford station wagons in 1957, the massive 369-acre Michigan Assembly plant in Wayne became one of the world’s most important and profitable factories when it made Ford Expeditions and Lincoln Navigators from 1996 to 2008.

“We have been waiting for this day for a long time,” said Michigan Assembly Plant Manager Erik Williams.

“The Ranger is back home in the US and our employees at Michigan Assembly Plant are thrilled to be able to build it for our customers.”

From 1966, the facility began a 30-year run of building the Bronco, one of the most popular SUVs in post-war America, before it was killed off after five generations in 1996 – two years after the nationally televised OJ Simpson police chase with which the Bronco nameplate is inextricably linked.

“The revitalisation of the Michigan Assembly Plant and renewed production of the Ford Ranger is another exciting chapter in our state’s comeback story,” said Michigan Governor Rick Snyder.

“This is also an opportunity to look toward its promising future with production of the all-new Ford Bronco on the horizon. I thank our partners at Ford for investing in Michigan and contributing to the Motor City’s legacy as the automotive capital of the world.”