Feb 2023

Ford Idles Louisville Assembly

Ford Motor Co. idled its Louisville Assembly Plant this week over a software issue that’s affecting the recently freshened Escape crossover, according to the plant’s building chairman. It’s the second Ford plant down this week due to quality problems; the automaker has also halted production and shipments of the F-150 Lightning, built in Dearborn, Mich., over a potential battery issue.

Workers in Louisville were told late last week the plant would be idled Feb. 13-19th.

In a separate message, the plant’s building chairman, Brandon Reisinger, said it was a software issue with the vehicle’s cluster. “We’re on a day-by-day basis right now and I know that’s frustrating,” Reisinger told employees. “The issue we’ve got, the cluster, is a software issue. It’s not a hardware issue. If it were to get out, it would not be something that would endanger anybody … but it would have the vehicles coming back to the dealership.”