End of the road for the Ford Fiesta

[Halcyon]

Ford bosses have confirmed that the Ford Fiesta will be discontinued from June next year.

Ford has sold 4.8million Fiestas in 46 years and it had 12 consecutive years as the biggest seller from 2009 to 2020.




I've loved my Fiesta's over the years and find them great little cars.
They are not very expensive, small enough to run around town, and parts are not expensive to replace.


Ford are now going to be focussing on introducing new electric vehicles but this will make the car prices a lot more expensive.




Anyone here a fan of the Fiesta?
What do you think of Ford's move?

Inevitable, with the ban on new fossil fuel cars now just 8 years away. That’s comfortably less than the design and life cycle of a modern car. Manufacturers have tried electrifying what they already have, and have discovered what they really ought to have known, namely that a chassis designed for a petrol engine and a fuel tank is unsuitable for a massive battery pack and electric motors.

The prices of electric cars still suffer from lack of production scale and the early adopter premium. In the long run they shouldn’t be more expensive than what they replace.

I had a Rover Metro in my salad days so I have no particular love for the Fiesta (actually I don’t think I ever knew anyone who had one). I’ve had a couple of Fords in my lifetime, first an Orion which was reliable and just what I needed commuting weekly from Liverpool to Newcastle for a few months. Second was a Focus Estate which drove fine but leaked. Thankfully it was a company car so the many weeks it spent at garages while they tried (and failed) to find out where the water was getting in was never my problem. They just gave me a different car. Actually one of those was a Mondeo Titanium which I had for 3 weeks … that was very nice.

My wife was a big Fiesta fan (had three over the years), but now has a KA+.

I’ve had an Escort and a Mondeo (briefly) as company cars, and bought a Focus Estate privately which we had for 8 years.

[TheDaddy]

Good, Ford has gone so far down hill the last few years, the company I work for won't buy them again, last Tuesday we had 100% of them of the road, four out of four with the oldest being 3 years one month old and the youngest 1 year old

[Halcyon]

I think the Fiestas will be more in demand if the new electric cars are too expensive.
We will have to see.


I know that I intend to keep mine for a good while.

---------- Post added at 12:37 ---------- Previous post was at 12:36 ----------

Originally Posted by TheDaddy

Good, Ford has gone so far down hill the last few years, the company I work for won't buy them again, last Tuesday we had 100% of them of the road, four out of four with the oldest being 3 years one month old and the youngest 1 year old

What will you be switching to?

[TheDaddy]

Originally Posted by Halcyon

I think the Fiestas will be more in demand if the new electric cars are too expensive.
We will have to see.


I know that I intend to keep mine for a good while.

---------- Post added at 12:37 ---------- Previous post was at 12:36 ----------






What will you be switching to?

Don't know, not decision but when you consider it costs 2k for a charging point I doubt we'll be going electric

[Rillington]

I guess all cars eventually come to the end of the road

Seriously, as a family we had a Ford Escort at one time. I believe Escorts stopped being made a while ago.

[joglynne]

I loved my XR2, bright red and it always made me feel happy. Had to get rid of it when I needed a bigger boot for a wheelchair. Must admit I cried.

I've never had a Fiesta (my daughter has one), I have a Focus (Estate).

---------- Post added at 19:01 ---------- Previous post was at 18:57 ----------

Originally Posted by Chris

Inevitable, with the ban on new fossil fuel cars now just 8 years away.

This is currently a nightmare pipe dream.

There is no way we can support a massive increase in electric cars, hell, we are not even sure atm if we can supply our current electricity needs, let alone the massive increase that would require. As it stands, they are either going to have to revise this, or watch the country grind to a halt (in the dark).

Originally Posted by Paul

I've never had a Fiesta (my daughter has one), I have a Focus (Estate).

---------- Post added at 19:01 ---------- Previous post was at 18:57 ----------


This is currently a nightmare pipe dream.

There is no way we can support a massive increase in electric cars, hell, we are not even sure atm if we can supply our current electricity needs, let alone the massive increase that would require. As it stands, they are either going to have to revise this, or watch the country grind to a halt (in the dark).

I think that’s a fair bet, but the process of designing, building and eventually retiring a model is so long, that with the legislation as it now stands (and it’s not just the UK that’s passed such laws) the manufacturers have no choice but to plan for it.

[Halcyon]

There is nowhere near enough infrastructure in place to support everyone moving to electric cars.

Most electric cars are too expensive for the average driver.
Even if we could all afford them, how is someone in a terraced house or flat who parks his car on the street going to charge it? Run a cable accross the pavement to his bedroom window?!


Plus, If I'm doing a long journey and I run low on fuel, I pull into a petrol station and 5 minutes later drive off. Even the fastsest of chargers won't let me get away with a full charge in 5 minutes.


So..... I will be holding on to my Fiesta for as long as I can. We've also had S-Max and C-Max Ford's and they've been spot on, never had any big issues.

I don't understand why they don't just do an electric Fiesta?

---------- Post added at 08:58 ---------- Previous post was at 08:55 ----------

Originally Posted by Halcyon

There is nowhere near enough infrastructure in place to support everyone moving to electric cars.

We might not hit the deadline but don't underestimate how quickly that infrastructure could develop when we hit an inflexion point of how many electric cars are out there. I see electric cars slowly increasing each year and then suddenly a rapid increase which will lead to a rapid increase in infrastructure which will lead to a further increase of electric cars. In just a few years towards the end of this decade, I can see it shifting dramatically.

Originally Posted by Halcyon

There is nowhere near enough infrastructure in place to support everyone moving to electric cars.

There certainly isn’t enough infrastructure right now. But not everyone has an electric car right now. We will need to see what government plans there are to ensure everyone who needs access to charging facilities can get it when they need it. Remember, in 8 years sales of new petrol/diesel cars will end. Cars already sold will remain on the road for years to come, so there will not need to be charging sufficient for 30 million cars on 1 January 2030.

Most electric cars are too expensive for the average driver.

As I said earlier, new technology costs more. The manufacturer is recouping relatively more of the research and development cost in early sales. Plus, they are not producing at a scale where the process is as efficient as it eventually will be.

By the time we all have no choice but to own an electric car they are unlikely to be significantly different in price to what you would pay for a new petrol model today.

Even if we could all afford them, how is someone in a terraced house or flat who parks his car on the street going to charge it? Run a cable accross the pavement to his bedroom window?!

Plus, If I'm doing a long journey and I run low on fuel, I pull into a petrol station and 5 minutes later drive off. Even the fastsest of chargers won't let me get away with a full charge in 5 minutes.

There are answers to both of these, although admittedly they are a bit chicken-or-egg, so to try to take them together …

When thinking in terms of refuelling time, you’re thinking like a petrol car owner, which is fair enough as that’s all you’ve ever been. But think of it this way: why would you choose to refill your ‘tank’ (battery) from empty, mid-journey, when you could leave home with it full every morning?

We refuel our cars the way we do because that’s what their design demands of us. Electric cars have a different design and therefore demand a different approach to refuelling. In many cases this will mean overnight charging at home. For those who can’t get their car on a driveway, in some cases I suspect councils may introduce on-street charging, however it is more likely that the places people park their cars when they go out during the day will become the filling stations of the future.

The killer statistic is this: in the UK, the average car is used just 1 hour in every 24. If even one of those idle hours is spent at a destination other than home then there’s no reason why that car can’t be fully charged there.

And for the minority who do a lot of high mileage motorway driving, then the distance covered on a single charge is such that quite frankly, an enforced half-hour rest to recharge the battery is only going to make UK roads safer.

So..... I will be holding on to my Fiesta for as long as I can. We've also had S-Max and C-Max Ford's and they've been spot on, never had any big issues.

Enjoy it while you can.

[tweetiepooh]

I have had Mondeos for many year, drive them into the ground but they too are no longer made. My problem is more the lack of alternatives. If you want a nice, large estate, Mondeo price, Mondeo features (heated windscreen for example), easy servicing, "cheapish" parts where do you go. Everyone seems to want to go to SUV type cars, big, high etc.

Skoda Superb?