Good morning! It’s Monday, August 19, 2024, and this is The Morning Shift, your daily roundup of the top automotive headlines from around the world, in one place. Here are the important stories you need to know.
1st Gear: Ford Recalls 85,000 Cop Cars Over Engine Fire Fears
Of all the automakers in all of the land, Ford is king when it comes to one important metric: recalls. The American brand has called back everything from pickup trucks to electric vehicles for repairs this year, and now it’s issued a new recall impacting more than 80,000 cop cars across America.
Ford’s latest recall affects 85,000 Explorer SUVs that are in use across America as police interceptors, reports ABC News. The recall was called due to engine issues on the SUVs that mean the motors could fail without warning and even catch fire:
The National Highway Traffic Safety Administration said Friday that the recall is for vehicles with model years 2020 to 2022 and have 3.3L hybrid or gas engines.
The NHTSA said that if an engine failure occurs, significant quantities of engine oil or fuel vapor may be released into the under hood area and may migrate to and accumulate near ignition sources, resulting in a potential under-hood fire, localized melting of components, or smoke.
The agency said that as of July 9, there are 13 reports of under hood fires in North America resulting from engine block breaches on Explorer PIU vehicles built with 3.3L engines made before June 2, 2022. There are no reports of fire resulting from engine block breaches on non-police vehicles.
As a result of the recall, Ford has issues guidance to Explorer drivers to park their cars and shut the engine off whenever they hear “unexpected” engine noises or feel a reduction in torque, reports ABC News. Ford also launched an investigation into the issue in order to determine a cause and set out a plan to rectify the problem.
Ford says that, so far, it hasn’t been made aware of any injuries as a result of the engine problems.
If you are worried that your police car might be affected by a recall, there are a few easy ways to check if it’s the case. First up, the NHTSA has a super handy app that you can use to see if your vehicle is impacted by a recall, or you can head to the regulator’s website and plug your VIN into its recall search tool.
2nd Gear: EV Growth Far Outpacing The Rest Of The Industry
Sales of electric cars here in America is a hot topic these days, with some applauding its growth in recent years and others warning that sales aren’t rising as fast as they should be. Now, new analysis of new car registrations across America show that electric car sales are actually growing at a much faster rate than the rest of the auto industry.
According to a new report from Automotive News, sales of battery-powered models across America are up compared with the rest of the industry. The boost has been spurred on by price cuts, tax breaks and other incentives aimed at encouraging Americans to go electric:
“The June month numbers were good for EVs,” said Kent Chiu, an analyst at S&P Global Mobility. “But behind them were pretty strong incentives as a motivator.”
New EV registrations rose 3.1 percent in June from a year earlier to 108,026 vehicles compared with an 8.8 percent drop in the broader light-vehicle market to just over 1.2 million, S&P Global Mobility said.
The relatively strong showing pushed EV market share to 8.9 percent in June from 7.9 percent in June 2023. The registration data, which is the most recent available, doesn’t include gasoline-electric hybrids or used vehicles.
While the growing share of American car sales is good news for EV proponents, the latest sales figures did come with a warning. Experts pointed out that the prevalence of tax breaks and other incentives for EVs could be the only reason EV sales are growing compared with gas models. These offers, they claim, are essential in order to convince some buyers to go electric.
Without these price cuts, which can reach as much as $18,000 on some models, hesitant buyers may not be as likely to make the switch. Still, these offers are clearly working out as for now EV registrations have risen dramatically in the first half of 2024, reports Automotive News. According to the site, registrations are up seven percent compared with 2023.
3rd Gear: Tesla Will Pay You To Play Robots
You might think of Tesla as America’s largest electric car maker, but that’s not really how the company thinks of itself anymore. Instead, Tesla boss Elon Musk is determined to turn the automaker into a tech and artificial intelligence company, hence his intense focus on self-driving cars and robots. Now, after slashing its workforce across America, the company is looking for new employees who can pretend to be robots in order to train the algorithms that will power its future humanoid machines.
The approach is similar to how Tesla programs its Autopilot system, with engineers training the algorithm to recognize and respond to things like crosswalks and parked police cars. Now, Tesla wants to do the same for its robots by paying people to pretend to be a robot for the day, reports Business Insider:
The role, which has the title “Data Collection Operator,” requires workers to walk along test routes and perform designated tasks while wearing a motion-capture suit and a virtual reality headset for more than seven hours per day, according to the job description from Tesla’s Careers page. In addition to collecting data, workers are also expected to analyze the information they’ve gathered, write daily reports on it, as well as work on some minor tasks related to their equipment and its software.
It also has very specific height requirements and calls for people between five foot, seven inches and five foot, eleven inches. Christian Hubicki, a roboticist out of Florida A&M University, said Tesla is likely looking for individuals who will not only fit into the specific suits, but will also have similar sizing to the robot, which Musk has said will clock in around five foot, eight inches.
Over the past year, the company has reportedly hired “dozens of workers” to train the humanoid robot, which it calls Optimus. The role reportedly pays as much as $48 per hour and required employees to wear motion-capture suits, like they do in the movies, as well as VR headsets “for long stretches of time,” reports BI.
The hiring spree for mo-cap fans marks a stark contrast to the waves of layoffs Tesla was announcing at the start of this year when it cut job listings, sacked staff and even slashed internship opportunities.
4th Gear: Canadian Rail Shutdown Looms
Strikes and shutdowns are looming north of the border in Canada, where talks between rail operators and workers have broken down, reports Reuters. A lockout is now looming on Canada’s freight network that could see 10,000 Teamsters union members unable to work later this week.
The lockout is the latest saga in talks between the union and Canadian National Railway and Canadian Pacific Kansas City, reports Reuters. From early Thursday morning, 10,000 union members will be locked out of their jobs unless last-minute talks can rectify the situation:
It marks the first time that the country has faced a simultaneous labor stoppage at the railroad firms as they normally negotiate their labor agreements in alternate years.
The stoppages could cripple the shipment of food grains, beans, potash, coal and timber which form a large part of Canada’s exports, while also impacting shipments ranging from petroleum products to chemicals and cars.
In addition to billions of dollars of economic damage, the stoppages could disrupt rail trade across the North American continent.
Rail operators claim that talks with unions heralded “no real progress” over the weekend, so authorized the lockout after months of meetings over new contracts for unionized workers. The rail operators say they have made multiple contract offers that address issues like “wages, rest, and labor availability,” reports Reuters. However, the union is opposed to measures that it says could force workers to move across Canada with minimal notice in order to fill labor shortages.
In response to the lockout order from the two rail operators, the Teamsters union, which represents workers such as rail traffic controllers and locomotive engineers, issued a 72-hour strike notice to Canadian Pacific Kansas City, which could hit ahead of the lockout.