Ford Reducing Use of Rare Minerals

Ford is making strides to make their Hybrids more efficient and more cost effective eliminating minerals such as: Neodymium, cerium, lanthanum and praseodymium – rare earth metals used in the manufacture of nickel-metal-hydride batteries for hybrid vehicles.

Now lighter, more efficient, more powerful batteries are expected to reduce the company's use of rare earth metals by up to 500,000 pounds a year including dysprosium, the most expensive rare earth metal, which has reduced around 50 percent in the new lithium-ion batteries now powering Ford hybrids.

Get more info on how Ford is making a better tomorrow by visiting: http://rareearthinvestingnews.com/8039/ford-rare-earth-elements-electric-vehicles-lithium-ion-batteries/.

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The Future Of Ford

In the past whenever we thought of cars from the future the first thing to come to mind was often flight visualizing hovercraft or "Skycars", but in recent times the Disney-style imagination has changed to something much more practical often utilizing a greater form of technology similar to what we currently have.

Ford follows exactly this line of thought by breaking down into 3 tiers of progression: 0-5 years from now, 5-10 years, and 10-15 years from now.

Techcrunch writes:


Some of the speakers at today’s Techonomy Detroit conference talked about how entrepreneurship and technology can help Detroit diversify its economy beyond automobile manufacturing. But that doesn’t mean we have to give up on the car companies.

Ford, for example, seems to be in the middle of a reinvention. At the conference, I had a chance to interview Paul Mascarenas, the company’s CTO and vice president of research and innovation, about Ford’s vision for the car of the future — a vision includes some pretty dramatic changes.

Mascarenas distinguished between the near-term (the next five years), the mid-term (5-10 years from now), and the long-term (10-15 years and beyond) future. In the near-term, he said Ford vehicles will look more-or-less the same, but they’re going to be more fuel efficient and increasingly electric. We’re also going to see more driver assistance features that try to improve safety.

Read more: http://techcrunch.com/2012/09/12/ford-paul-mascaneras-techonomy/

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Date Night With Ford

There's pretty much an app for everything these days and recently those apps have started migrating to the automobile sector with improvements to cars such as Ford Sync and My Ford Touch, but this one is REALLY interesting.

With a new partnership with Dates.fm Ford Sync will now support an app for people on the go looking for fun date ideas.

CNet has the details:


Seeking new apps to integrate with its cars through Sync AppLink, Ford hosted its annual Developer Challenge at TechCrunch Disrupt. This year's winner is startup Dates.fm, a Web site and app designed to give couples suggestions about what to do on date nights.

Dates.fm and its sister site, BeCouply, are currently in beta. A counter on the BeCouply site says it will launch in 3 days and 21 hours. The founders of Dates.fm, Becky Cruze and Pius Uzamere, attended the TechCrunch Disrupt event and entered the Dates.fm app in the Ford Challenge, using the Sync API to develop voice commands and interface elements that would make the app usable in a car.

Read More: http://reviews.cnet.com/8301-13746_7-57510647-48/ford-sync-advises-what-to-do-on-a-date/

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2013 Mustang - Anything But Conventional

The Ford Mustang touts power, good fuel economy AND style breaking the conventional mold other models stick to making sure to not make any sacrifices.

Cnet did a review on the Mustang saying the following:


Conventional wisdom says you must trade power for fuel economy, or vice versa. In that case, the 2013 Ford Mustang GT must be either unwise or unconventional.

The newest generation of Ford's pony car, in GT form, sticks with a V-8 engine, displacing a big 5 liters, good for 420 horsepower and 390 pound-feet of torque. At the same time, the car's EPA numbers reach 18 mpg city and 25 mpg highway. I would have thought Ford found a way to game the EPA tests, until CNET's review car wound up with an average of 20 mpg over city, freeway, and back-road flogging.

Lacking direct injection, forced induction, or a colony of hamsters helping to spin the crankshaft, how does Ford defy our notions of power and fuel economy? Mostly by letting the engine run very slow in 90 percent of driving situations. Driving the Mustang GT along freeways at 70 mph or in the city at 20 mph, the tach needle stayed resolutely under 2,000 rpm, usually hovering just about 1,000. The sweep from 2,000 to redline only feels the needle on those rarer roads when you can keep the gears low and the power up.

Read more: http://reviews.cnet.com/coupe-hatchback/2013-ford-mustang-gt/4505-10867_7-35432450.html

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