Ford shifts production back into gear at seven plants after identifying transmission defect

Ford was forced to halt production at seven assembly plants after finding a quality problem with a transmission component, but all seven plants affected by the stoppage should be up and running again today.

A supplied component, described as "a clutch mechanism that helps make the transmission shift smoothly between first and second gears" (sounds to us like the overrunning clutch), was found to be problematic, but the defect was caught before any suspect vehicles were delivered to customers. The supplier isn't being identified.

More than 4,000 units of light truck, van, and Lincoln Town Car production were lost, costing Ford somewhere in the neighborhood of $35M. The automaker says that making up for the stoppage won't be a problem, as they seem to have a bit of extra capacity to put towards the effort, and F-150 inventories are current running at about 107 days of sales.

[Source: Detroit News]