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Ford Transit customs ready to work for SEMA

Ford's booth at the SEMA Show this year looks to have two, big themes. The Blue Oval is bringing over a dozen takes on the 2015 Mustang to the event, and it's now also announcing five customized versions on the 2015 Transit to join the modded pony cars. Each of the vans shows off a different use for the spacious commercial vehicle, from plush luxury to offroad ruggedness.
You probably don't think of the Transit as hitting the trails, but that's just what the take on the design from the Vegas Off-Road Experience (pictured above) is for. The company gives people the opportunity to drive a desert race truck, and this custom is meant to drive them to events. It should be able to take on the terrain a little better with off-road wheels and tires and fender flares, but inside passengers get serious luxury thanks to a 60-inch LED TV and video game systems.
Alternatively the blazing red Designed Travel Transit (right) is all about long road trips. The interior features four captain's chairs with heating, cooling and massage functions, and there's a 4K 50-inch TV to watch. For a touch of added class, the floor is made from hickory.

Ford will lay off 700 employees in Michigan

Lagging sales of compact and electric cars are starting to take their toll on automakers. Ford said Thursday it intends to lay off 700 employees who work at the Michigan Assembly Plant in Wayne, MI, over the next five months. The plant makes Ford Focus and C-Max vehicles. Sales of both have stalled in recent months. The layoffs affect 675 hourly and 25 salaries employees, and will begin in late June and continue through September, according to paperwork filed with state officials. The company expects to re-hire the affected employees elsewhere and use them on temporary basis throughout the summer. Ford spokesperson Kristina Adamski said the affected employees will be "first in line" for other jobs at nearby plants, and UAW vice president Jimmy Settles said he expected all would be re-hired at other southeast Michigan factories by "early 2016." Although industry sales have remained high overall, the growth has come from SUVs and pickup trucks. Conversely, compact cars and alternate-powered vehicles like the C-Max have struggled to find customers amid cheap gasoline prices. Focus monthly sales fell 14.5 percent year over year in March, and C-Max monthly sales dropped 22.9 percent over the same period. It was less than three years ago that Ford hailed the Michigan Assembly Plant as a model for its future, one that would quickly adapt to market conditions through a more flexible assembly process. The plant was retrofitted at a cost of $550 million so that the same assembly line could install electric, plug-in hybrid or gasoline powertrains. Ford produces the Focus, Focus ST, Focus Electric, C-Max Hybrid and C-Max Energi here. At the time, company officials said the flexible line was a way to "not be trapped with dedicated one-trick-pony plants where you have under-capacity or over-capacity situations," said Jim Tetreault, Ford's vice president of North American manufacturing, in November 2012. But that's exactly where Ford finds itself as consumers have turned away from both compact and gas-sipping hybrids and electrics as gas prices have fallen to a national average of $2.49 per gallon, according to Thursday's AAA Fuel Gauge Report. One year ago, gas prices averaged $3.70 per gallon. In perhaps a melancholy twist, the Ford Expedition and Lincoln Navigator that were phased out at Michigan Assembly by the retrofit are once again the types of vehicles that are sought after by consumers.

Man turns Ford Fiesta into a one-car band

The one-man band is a rather ridiculous idea, drawing up images of one person attempting to manipulate several instruments, at once, in a vain attempt at creating music. It's usually represented by silly scenes like this. Interestingly, the concept isn't much more successful when the "man" in "one-man band" is replaced with "car," as we see in this video.
It seems that someone rigged up and edited (699 times, we might add) a Ford Fiesta, a bucket, 12 PVC pipes and the natural sounds that a car makes to come up with a song. Now, we don't recognize the tune, so we've no idea if this is a cover or an original piece. And while it's hardly Beethoven, we have to admire the amount of effort the "conductor" went to in his attempt to turn a subcompact car into a musical instrument(s). Take a look (or listen) below for the entire video.