4 ms·

Official: Ford's $29,945 Small EV Truck Is Called Fathom

31 points by thehoff 2mo ago

Neywiny 2mo ago
So they made the battery, arguably the most concerning thing to replace as the vehicle ages, ridiculous to replace? At least they're not reusing names for entirely new things. Mustang Mach-e is so weird. New vehicle, new name. Good
- erxam 2mo ago
  Aging isn't the real problem. Batteries are being found to last ages and ages more than they were ever thought to. By the time it needs to be changed, these will be considered as antiques. I think the real problem will be in crashes and insurance. The amount of cars that will be totaled for a fender bender will be nuts.
  - pstuart 2mo ago
    Upgrading would make that a nice to have. 8 years or so and battery tech should have an affordable higher capacity unit that could give new life to it. I got a refurbed Nissan Leaf with a 40KWh battery (replaced the original 24KWh battery) which added enough range to eliminate range anxiety whilst tootling about the metro area.
  - dzhiurgis 2mo ago
    Nah real problem, especially on smaller cells like 18650 back of the day is balance or temperature cable welds that randomly pop off, rendering entire pack useless and very laborious to repair. Rest of the things are very rare. If you crash hard enough to damage battery usually entire car is written off. I've been looking for used Tesla in Eastern Europe. Battery repairs are so rare (I think I found 2). Post-crash rebuilds are basically 95% of cars sold here. 100% if car is from USA.
  - vablings 2mo ago
    The idea of giga casting is horrible. One frame crack and its toast, I don't care how much people talk about that damn "Tesla glue" its forever structurally compromised. Steel frame rails, good crash protection bolted to those frames and then a battery in the middle. Keep it simple and repairable.
k12sosse 2mo ago
Shoulda gone with Canyonero as the name. Love my ranger. ~700km on a tank of gasoline. Easy to work on at home. The factory installed upfitter switches make adding 12v additions easy.
- atonse 2mo ago
  Hahaha when I saw ranchero I had the same thought and started singing the canyonero song in my head. https://youtu.be/PI_Jl5WFQkA https://youtu.be/PI_Jl5WFQkA
kristianp 2mo ago
If it's about the size of a Maverick as the article suggests, that's not small at all.
- GenerWork 2mo ago
  The Maverick is pretty small compared to other trucks. Smaller than a Ranger, and much, much smaller than the quarter and half ton trucks.
  - red-iron-pine 2mo ago
    smaller than a modern Ranger, not the original 2-seater the modern Ranger is the same size as the old F-150
  - erxam 2mo ago
    Smaller doesn't necessarily mean small. Rangers are just normal big, and upper tier trucks are absolutely monstrous. You know what I thought the Maverick was sized like before looking it up? A Volkswagen Saveiro.
addaon 2mo ago
Shouldn't a Fathom have a six foot bed, by definition?
- aareet 2mo ago
  Not at that unfathomably low price
- m463 2mo ago
  maybe they deep-sixed that definition in the marketing documents.
dyauspitr 2mo ago
For what it’s worth, I absolutely love my f-150 lightning. I just wish we had 1 MW charging like the Chinese do.
- bayesnet 2mo ago
  I’d be happy to get the advertised charge speeds on my Equinox. The number of times I use a charging station that delivers ~120kW at most is maddening. And it’s this kind of thing that stops mass adoption. When you fuel an ICE car, the pump just delivers fuel and that’s that. The price of fuel is prominently advertised and the experience is the same no matter the station. Charging on the other hand is an exercise in frustration. Charging stations have different advertised power delivery rates; often they can’t meet those rates (is it the charging station? Is it your car? No way to know!); pricing is opaque; charging can stop seemingly at random .. and then you get levied the penalty congestion rate for using a charging station. My parents asked me if they should get an EV. I advised a conventional hybrid. They are too old to have the patience to deal with all this.
  - dyauspitr 2mo ago
    It heavily depends on what kind of driving you do. I would say 97% of my driving is local and home charging works perfectly while being 10x cheaper than an equivalent gas vehicle. For the 3% of the time that I do long trips I might have charging issues but frankly it hasn’t been a nightmare, just waiting a little longer at some charging stations. Once or twice over the last four years, I’ve driven to an Electric America charging station to find that it is being renovated and I only have 30 miles of range left and next closest charging station is 50 miles away. That has mostly been resolved since Tesla chargers became available to Ford vehicles.
    - bayesnet 2mo ago
      Yes, totally agree—I love the car and for nearly all of my driving it’s great. It’s just that the residual of long drives is more of an issue than some say because of how inconsistent the experience is. For someone my parents age, for whom things not working as expected is more befuddling and aggravating than for me, I just don’t think it’s tolerable (and they do many more road trips in retirement anyway).
maxlin 2mo ago
Imagine buying a new EV that can't drive itself. What a waste of money
- aae42 2mo ago
  Disagree, I rather not subsidize that. I also don't really get why it has to be an EV, can't a self driving car just as easily be gas powered?
  - maxlin 2mo ago
    Self-driving usually intersects with EV's simply for the fact that EV's are a newer idea, and self-driving can't (sadly) be really well currently added to existing cars. Comma.ai isn't really on the track to compete. Those that are in market for an ICE car have an order of magnitude larger used car market available for them. You can get a car from the year 2000 and drive it no problem. If you are looking at a car that's the best worth for your money, while "subsidizing" better future tech that will directly save lives, if the latter is an added negative for you, well that's just misanthropy.
everybodyknows 2mo ago
> the architecture uses large aluminum unicastings to incorporate more than 100 parts that would otherwise be separate They may have learned a few tricks from those teardowns of BYDs.
- red-iron-pine 2mo ago
  so what happens when something breaks? in theory this is 100 more points of failure honest question, not sure how BYD handles this either. but BYDs are cheap enough that if you need to you get another...
- vablings 2mo ago
  I honestly think unicastings are a horrible idea. BYD for most of its flagship vehicles do not use unicasting. I think unicasting should be reserved for the cheapest of vehicles in which an accident means the vehicle is recycled rather than unsafely repaired.
  - rasz 2mo ago
    You can weld and glue aluminum, nothing unsafe about it as long as you cut out the damaged part.
- m463 2mo ago
  that started with another US car manufacturer, tesla. (although tesla had casting hiccups with the suspension components of the model x) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giga_Press https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giga_Press
bob1029 2mo ago
> Rather than a distinct floor component, the Fathom’s interior parts mount directly to the top of the structural battery. I'm looking forward to the IIHS test results.
- a012 2mo ago
  Safety asides it sounds like they build the car like a phone, so probably the repairs cost would be more expensive in the long run
- vablings 2mo ago
  Most EV's use a structural battery like this either for frames or direct attachments. Go have a look at some EURO NCAP testing of Chinese EV's
deflator 2mo ago
An electric ute? I'm interested. Seems like a good move!
kotaKat 2mo ago
Ford once again getting the messaging wrong and shipping what is essentially a glorified sedan with a useless external 4 foot bed. Why do we have to keep making family-haulers for whipped dads that aren't allowed to have a two-seater? Why do we HAVE to force the entire family to go with us wherever we go? The wife already gets the lifted Expedition XLT to nearly run over little Jimmy with at the crosswalk (or as I lovingly call it, the 'F Series' - Canyonero strikes again). Give us back a two seat basic pickup like the Ranger used to be, cowards.
- dyauspitr 2mo ago
  Two seaters means you need a whole other vehicle if you have a family.
  - graceful6800 2mo ago
    Back in my day we just threw the kids into the bed of the truck and we came out fine
    - conception 2mo ago
      https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Survivorship_bias https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Survivorship_bias
burnt-resistor 2mo ago
I'd pick a $5k cheaper, analog Slate instead for not having to deal with Ford's post-sales ads, subscriptions, and DRM.
- pennomi 2mo ago
  I’d buy a Slate above this even if the Ford was cheaper, specifically for those same reasons.
  - m463 2mo ago
    Remember that vizio makes more money from "processing" your data than from the tv itself. I think we need car-based ad blockers.
    - burnt-resistor 2mo ago
      Perhaps the way forward is an independent shop service to disable the onboard cellular modem(s) such that they cannot dial-home to load anything new. (It would likely disable the concierge and emergency services features too.) Similar to how there are/were alarm/stereo installation services.

31 points by thehoff 2mo ago

So they made the battery, arguably the most concerning thing to replace as the vehicle ages, ridiculous to replace? At least they're not reusing names for entirely new things. Mustang Mach-e is so weird. New vehicle, new name. Good

erxam 2mo ago
Aging isn't the real problem. Batteries are being found to last ages and ages more than they were ever thought to. By the time it needs to be changed, these will be considered as antiques. I think the real problem will be in crashes and insurance. The amount of cars that will be totaled for a fender bender will be nuts.
- pstuart 2mo ago
  Upgrading would make that a nice to have. 8 years or so and battery tech should have an affordable higher capacity unit that could give new life to it. I got a refurbed Nissan Leaf with a 40KWh battery (replaced the original 24KWh battery) which added enough range to eliminate range anxiety whilst tootling about the metro area.
- dzhiurgis 2mo ago
  Nah real problem, especially on smaller cells like 18650 back of the day is balance or temperature cable welds that randomly pop off, rendering entire pack useless and very laborious to repair. Rest of the things are very rare. If you crash hard enough to damage battery usually entire car is written off. I've been looking for used Tesla in Eastern Europe. Battery repairs are so rare (I think I found 2). Post-crash rebuilds are basically 95% of cars sold here. 100% if car is from USA.
- vablings 2mo ago
  The idea of giga casting is horrible. One frame crack and its toast, I don't care how much people talk about that damn "Tesla glue" its forever structurally compromised. Steel frame rails, good crash protection bolted to those frames and then a battery in the middle. Keep it simple and repairable.

k12sosse 2mo ago

Shoulda gone with Canyonero as the name. Love my ranger. ~700km on a tank of gasoline. Easy to work on at home. The factory installed upfitter switches make adding 12v additions easy.

atonse 2mo ago
Hahaha when I saw ranchero I had the same thought and started singing the canyonero song in my head. https://youtu.be/PI_Jl5WFQkA https://youtu.be/PI_Jl5WFQkA

kristianp 2mo ago

If it's about the size of a Maverick as the article suggests, that's not small at all.

GenerWork 2mo ago
The Maverick is pretty small compared to other trucks. Smaller than a Ranger, and much, much smaller than the quarter and half ton trucks.
- red-iron-pine 2mo ago
  smaller than a modern Ranger, not the original 2-seater the modern Ranger is the same size as the old F-150
- erxam 2mo ago
  Smaller doesn't necessarily mean small. Rangers are just normal big, and upper tier trucks are absolutely monstrous. You know what I thought the Maverick was sized like before looking it up? A Volkswagen Saveiro.

addaon 2mo ago

Shouldn't a Fathom have a six foot bed, by definition?

aareet 2mo ago
Not at that unfathomably low price
m463 2mo ago
maybe they deep-sixed that definition in the marketing documents.

dyauspitr 2mo ago

For what it’s worth, I absolutely love my f-150 lightning. I just wish we had 1 MW charging like the Chinese do.

bayesnet 2mo ago
I’d be happy to get the advertised charge speeds on my Equinox. The number of times I use a charging station that delivers ~120kW at most is maddening. And it’s this kind of thing that stops mass adoption. When you fuel an ICE car, the pump just delivers fuel and that’s that. The price of fuel is prominently advertised and the experience is the same no matter the station. Charging on the other hand is an exercise in frustration. Charging stations have different advertised power delivery rates; often they can’t meet those rates (is it the charging station? Is it your car? No way to know!); pricing is opaque; charging can stop seemingly at random .. and then you get levied the penalty congestion rate for using a charging station. My parents asked me if they should get an EV. I advised a conventional hybrid. They are too old to have the patience to deal with all this.
- dyauspitr 2mo ago
  It heavily depends on what kind of driving you do. I would say 97% of my driving is local and home charging works perfectly while being 10x cheaper than an equivalent gas vehicle. For the 3% of the time that I do long trips I might have charging issues but frankly it hasn’t been a nightmare, just waiting a little longer at some charging stations. Once or twice over the last four years, I’ve driven to an Electric America charging station to find that it is being renovated and I only have 30 miles of range left and next closest charging station is 50 miles away. That has mostly been resolved since Tesla chargers became available to Ford vehicles.
  - bayesnet 2mo ago
    Yes, totally agree—I love the car and for nearly all of my driving it’s great. It’s just that the residual of long drives is more of an issue than some say because of how inconsistent the experience is. For someone my parents age, for whom things not working as expected is more befuddling and aggravating than for me, I just don’t think it’s tolerable (and they do many more road trips in retirement anyway).

maxlin 2mo ago

Imagine buying a new EV that can't drive itself. What a waste of money

aae42 2mo ago
Disagree, I rather not subsidize that. I also don't really get why it has to be an EV, can't a self driving car just as easily be gas powered?
- maxlin 2mo ago
  Self-driving usually intersects with EV's simply for the fact that EV's are a newer idea, and self-driving can't (sadly) be really well currently added to existing cars. Comma.ai isn't really on the track to compete. Those that are in market for an ICE car have an order of magnitude larger used car market available for them. You can get a car from the year 2000 and drive it no problem. If you are looking at a car that's the best worth for your money, while "subsidizing" better future tech that will directly save lives, if the latter is an added negative for you, well that's just misanthropy.

everybodyknows 2mo ago

> the architecture uses large aluminum unicastings to incorporate more than 100 parts that would otherwise be separate They may have learned a few tricks from those teardowns of BYDs.

red-iron-pine 2mo ago
so what happens when something breaks? in theory this is 100 more points of failure honest question, not sure how BYD handles this either. but BYDs are cheap enough that if you need to you get another...
vablings 2mo ago
I honestly think unicastings are a horrible idea. BYD for most of its flagship vehicles do not use unicasting. I think unicasting should be reserved for the cheapest of vehicles in which an accident means the vehicle is recycled rather than unsafely repaired.
- rasz 2mo ago
  You can weld and glue aluminum, nothing unsafe about it as long as you cut out the damaged part.
m463 2mo ago
that started with another US car manufacturer, tesla. (although tesla had casting hiccups with the suspension components of the model x) https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giga_Press https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Giga_Press

bob1029 2mo ago

> Rather than a distinct floor component, the Fathom’s interior parts mount directly to the top of the structural battery. I'm looking forward to the IIHS test results.

a012 2mo ago
Safety asides it sounds like they build the car like a phone, so probably the repairs cost would be more expensive in the long run
vablings 2mo ago
Most EV's use a structural battery like this either for frames or direct attachments. Go have a look at some EURO NCAP testing of Chinese EV's

deflator 2mo ago

An electric ute? I'm interested. Seems like a good move!

kotaKat 2mo ago

Ford once again getting the messaging wrong and shipping what is essentially a glorified sedan with a useless external 4 foot bed. Why do we have to keep making family-haulers for whipped dads that aren't allowed to have a two-seater? Why do we HAVE to force the entire family to go with us wherever we go? The wife already gets the lifted Expedition XLT to nearly run over little Jimmy with at the crosswalk (or as I lovingly call it, the 'F Series' - Canyonero strikes again). Give us back a two seat basic pickup like the Ranger used to be, cowards.

dyauspitr 2mo ago
Two seaters means you need a whole other vehicle if you have a family.
- graceful6800 2mo ago
  Back in my day we just threw the kids into the bed of the truck and we came out fine
  - conception 2mo ago
    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Survivorship_bias https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Survivorship_bias

burnt-resistor 2mo ago

I'd pick a $5k cheaper, analog Slate instead for not having to deal with Ford's post-sales ads, subscriptions, and DRM.

pennomi 2mo ago
I’d buy a Slate above this even if the Ford was cheaper, specifically for those same reasons.
- m463 2mo ago
  Remember that vizio makes more money from "processing" your data than from the tv itself. I think we need car-based ad blockers.
  - burnt-resistor 2mo ago
    Perhaps the way forward is an independent shop service to disable the onboard cellular modem(s) such that they cannot dial-home to load anything new. (It would likely disable the concierge and emergency services features too.) Similar to how there are/were alarm/stereo installation services.