Ford of Europe has announced new cars and LCVs for various production facilities. In short, the company’s assembly plants in Valencia and Saarlouis will build C-segment vehicles, while Cologne and Craiova will build B-segment models as well as three-cylinder petrol engines.
Valencia, which currently makes the C-MAX and Grand C-MAX, as well as the 2.0-litre EcoBoost engine, will build the replacements for today’s Transit Connect and Kuga.
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Saarlouis, which makes the existing Kuga as well as the Focus, will also become the European production location for the Focus Electric from late 2012. While Saarlouis has only been building the latest Focus for a few months, Ford has taken the extraordinary step of also stating that the successor model will be built there.
Another German plant, Cologne, will make the replacement for today’s Fiesta, while the current model will have a mid-lift facelift in 2012. Further, production of the forthcoming 1.0-litre EcoBoost engine is set to start at Cologne in the coming months.
Elsewhere in central Europe, the Craiova plant which once built Daewoos will start producing the Ford B-MAX from early 2012, with a second B-segment model to follow. These two new models are expected to eventually take the place of the Transit Connect which is presently made at Craiova. The three-cylinder 1.0-litre EcoBoost engine will also be made at the Romanian plant in the first quarter of next year.
Ford Otosan’s plant in Kocaeli will make not only the next generation Transit van but another unnamed LCV. Engineers based at the Turkish facility are also working on bringing the next Transit Connect to production at Valencia in Spain. As for Ford of Europe’s other Transit plant, there are no new investment plans as part of today’s announcements, the company simply reiterating its previous statement that it will make chassis cab variants of the next model at Southampton in the south of England.
See also: SPAIN: Ford axes plans to export C-MAX to US
