The 2024 Ford F-150 caught the same bug afflicting the 2024 Ford Ranger Raptor, except this time, the bug has spread throughout the entire F-150 lineup. Cars Direct saw one of the automaker’s recent dealer bulletins saying, in part, “We are announcing the decision to turn off the ability to submit new retail orders for 24MY F-150 on August 2nd, 2024. This impacts F-150 gas and hybrid only.” That means the 2024 F-150 Lightning hasn’t been sent to the shadow realm yet. Otherwise, buyers hoping to get an F-150 with their chosen colors and options have until Friday evening at 10 p.m. EST to get an order in.
Yet again, as with the Raptor Ranger, checking the forums shows any such order needs to be followed by patience about the delivery date. When we visited a thread at the Ranger6G forum called “Order Tracker Status,” we scrolled 57 pages of replies, many of them from posters either waiting on trucks they ordered as far back as a year ago or posters who canceled orders and bought out of dealer inventory. A thread at the F150Gen14 forum called “Anybody have their 24 built and/or delivered yet?” is up to 96 pages at the time of writing, and shares similar tales.
Part of the issue this time was a late production start, followed by a slow ramp-up as Ford took care of issues before delivering trucks, followed by constraints on some components such as the head-up display. Ford’s closing 2024 order books in early August compares to order books for the 2023 pickup closing in the first week of September last year. Yet the refreshed 2024 F-150 didn’t start down lines until December 2023, more than three months later. Company CEO Jim Farley said Ford sidestepped roughly 12 problems that could have led to recalls by pushing back the start of deliveries. Currently, a document outlining the automaker’s production schedule shows the HUD remains under constraint for trucks scheduled to be built the week of September 2, as does the turbocharged 2.7-liter EcoBoost engine that slid into the base slot on the 2024 pickup, the Tough Bed bedliner, and two wheel and tire options.
Ford’s still got the best-selling vehicle in the U.S. through the first six months, and with continuing indigestion on the balance sheet, the automaker will want to avoid the same delay with the 2025 F-150. Considering the supplier and market situations, we expect manufacturing planners are tearing their hair out trying to gauge the odds.