mustang

Ford unveiled a fully electric Mustang with over 900 horsepower at a car show in Las Vegas Wednesday. It’s not for sale, but the customized Mustang is intended to gauge interest in a high-performance electric car, Ford said.

Later this month Ford (F) will unveil a “Mustang inspired” electric SUV that customers will be able to buy. The SUV, however, will likely be far less powerful than this show car, which Ford is calling the Mustang Lithium.
Ford didn’t provide any exact performance figures for the Mustang Lithium, but described the car’s acceleration as “stunning.”

Created together with the automotive parts supplier Webasto, the Mustang Lithium has a six-speed manual transmission. That’s unusual in an electric car because, unlike gasoline and diesel-powered cars, electric cars don’t actually require a transmission with more than one speed. The transmission in the Mustang Lithium is a special heavy-duty transmission engineered to handle the 1,000 foot-pounds of torque, or pulling power, put out by the car’s electric motor.

The Mustang Lithium is powered by an 800-volt power system, more than double the power of most electric cars on the road today, according to Ford. The driver can select from four driving modes, including Sport, Track and Beast. The fourth is a Valet mode for when you have to hand someone else the key.
The Mustang Lithium was also created as a way to test heat management systems in an electric car, according to Ford. Electric car batteries and motors tend to heat up under hard use, such as racing.

The hood of the car has two small clear polycarbonate panels to allow a view of the battery pack and electric motor underneath..
The electric Mustang was unveiled at the Specialty Equipment Market Association (SEMA) show in Las Vegas, an industry trade show for companies that make add-on parts for cars and trucks. Major automakers frequently unveil customized show cars at the event. At last year’s SEMA show, General Motors (GM) unveiled a 700-horsepower electric Camaro.
Besides the upcoming SUV, Ford is also developing an all-electric version of the F-150 pickup. In order to have the greatest impact, Ford is starting its electric vehicle rollout with models tied to its most famous brands, Mustang and F-150, Ford executives have said.

Ford investing $850 million to build electric vehicle EVs in Michigan to
add more production capacity at a second U.S. factory for its next-generation battery-electric vehicle program.

Ford Motor Company said that it would more than double its investment in the production of electric vehicles, promising to spend $850 million on the technology by 2022. The auto giant will roll out 16 fully electric cars within five years, the first of which would arrive in 2020.

To boost its electric vehicle EV production, Ford is investing $850 million in its Flat Rock, Michigan, assembly plant. It hopes to make the plant the home of its EV production. To do so, the company will also hire 900 employees incrementally through 2023. This investment is part of Ford’s $11.1 billion commitment to electric vehicles, and it includes funding to build Ford’s next-generation Mustang in Michigan.

“We’ve taken a fresh look at the growth rates of electrified vehicles and know we need to protect additional production capacity given our accelerated plans for fully electric vehicles,” said Joe Hinrichs, Ford’s president of global operations, in a press release. The company previously announced it’s moving away from car production and simultaneously going electric. Ford is working on both a hybrid and an electric F-series, and it has partnered with VW on electric commercial vans and pickups.

In addition to its EV plans, Ford also announced it will complete its first autonomous vehicles in southeast Michigan–they’ll be available in 2021. In the meantime, the company says, it has an all-electric performance SUV coming from its Cuautitlan, Mexico, plant in 2020. It will also build its next-gen North American Transit Connect — a small van — in Mexico beginning in 2021. Ford recently announced plans to exit the heavy truck business in Brazil, and it’s working to “improve results” in Europe and China. With all these planned changes coming to Ford’s business in the next few years, it won’t be long before it barely resembles the car company as we’ve known it over the last decade.

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