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Mother’s Day weekend was a busy one. The kids had planned out the whole Sunday for the wife and I had planned the day before to build an area with a raised garden bed for the wife. The raised bed material was bought, the area mapped out and the plan to get up early and rent a truck to pick up cedar chips and black gold compost soil was scheduled.
Saturday morning went as I expected, up early, quick breakfast and off to be the first in line at the U-Haul rental place. Figured rather than $75 per delivery, two types of material meant $150, why not spend $19.95 for a single day rental of the truck, pick up the material myself and pocket $130 or so.
U-Haul actually has it to mileage and other fees that made the single days truck rental $55 and change, so not as big as I expected but still roughly a $95 savings.

Surprise was that the truck I got was a new 2019 F150 with V8 that only had 300 miles on the odometer. Having not been in a new Ford pickup in the last couple years, I was excited to see how it drove, what the fit n finish was like and over all materials.
U-Haul trucks are your base trucks with rubberized floors, dash is all hard plastics yet they still had backup camera and the V8 engine. As such the truck had no problem even loaded down with dirt or the cedar chips moving. Over all ride was decent and I actually really loved the seats as they were very supportive to my large size and yet comfy driving from freeway to local roads, never tiring to the body. Radio was a basic am/fm with a base pair of stereo speakers. Decent and functional.

Dash being a base truck was hard plastic, as we have seen in many videos about even top of the line Luxury auto’s, the dash did make a big amount of squeak noise. Screen size of the radio system was also very small. Yet as many folks have used the term, the truck was functional.

Fit n Finish was very tight, did not find any large panel gapes or errors in the paint job or exterior body.  I did find the very simple tie down points with already rusting bolts to be a bit surprising but it still worked and the truck had a bed so I did not have to worry about messing the truck bed up. Interesting observation is that when the truck is locked, so is the tailgate, so with a load, I had to always keep the truck unlocked so the tailgate would open and let me unload my chips and soil.
The V8 engine was very smooth and quiet and the only drawback was the weird auto stop / start. If you’re in normal traffic it works just as GMs systems have worked with turning off and on the engine. Yet sit in one place too long and then release the brake pedal and you get a message on the center dash screen saying you have been stationary too long and must put the transmission in park and then back to drive before engine will start back up. Even with following their directions, it seemed the engine did not want to start back up forcing me to put it into park and then manually starting the truck again.


Other than that single issue, the truck worked and the backup camera was nice to have to get as close as possible to the wife’s new raised veggie garden.

Hit me up with any questions you have about the truck or my project. Yes I did take out the grass the weekend before so my cedar chips are 3-4 inches deep.

Ford said that it would be cutting a shift from its Essex Engine Plant in Ontario starting in October.  Ford says the move will "better align with consumer demand".  The likely cause? Ford F-150 buyers are shifting more of their purchases away from the 5.0 liter V8.
F-150 buyers have a choice of 5 engines when selecting a truck, the 2.7-liter Ecoboost, the 3.3-liter V6, the 3.5-liter Ecoboost, and now a 3.0-liter PowerStroke Diesel, all in addition to the 5.0-liter V8, and the customer mix appears to be skewing towards the smaller displacement engines.
The cut in shifts will not result in job cuts as those workers will be transitioned to another engine plant to build the 7.3-liter engine due to be installed in the 2020 Ford Super Duties. That transition will happen in November of this year. 

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Ford said that it would be cutting a shift from its Essex Engine Plant in Ontario starting in October.  Ford says the move will "better align with consumer demand".  The likely cause? Ford F-150 buyers are shifting more of their purchases away from the 5.0 liter V8.
F-150 buyers have a choice of 5 engines when selecting a truck, the 2.7-liter Ecoboost, the 3.3-liter V6, the 3.5-liter Ecoboost, and now a 3.0-liter PowerStroke Diesel, all in addition to the 5.0-liter V8, and the customer mix appears to be skewing towards the smaller displacement engines.
The cut in shifts will not result in job cuts as those workers will be transitioned to another engine plant to build the 7.3-liter engine due to be installed in the 2020 Ford Super Duties. That transition will happen in November of this year. 

Ford reported first quarter operating earnings of $801m, up $160m over the same quarter last year.  The company says that it expects this quarter to be the strongest quarter of the year due to seasonal factors and major product launches later this year.  However, the company says it still expects to finish 2019 better than 2018.
Outside of North America, Ford is still losing money, but those losses are shrinking.  Ford recently announced a restructuring plan for Europe that included over 6,000 layoffs. 
Also in the earnings report, Ford revealed that the company is subject to a criminal investigation by the Justice Department due to its emissions certifications. We recently reported that Ford had launched its own internal investigation into its emissions certification process. 
Ford's stock rose more than 6% in premarket trading. 

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Ford reported first quarter operating earnings of $801m, up $160m over the same quarter last year.  The company says that it expects this quarter to be the strongest quarter of the year due to seasonal factors and major product launches later this year.  However, the company says it still expects to finish 2019 better than 2018.
Outside of North America, Ford is still losing money, but those losses are shrinking.  Ford recently announced a restructuring plan for Europe that included over 6,000 layoffs. 
Also in the earnings report, Ford revealed that the company is subject to a criminal investigation by the Justice Department due to its emissions certifications. We recently reported that Ford had launched its own internal investigation into its emissions certification process. 
Ford's stock rose more than 6% in premarket trading.