Ford F-150's endless recyclability will compensate its cost

The Ford F-150 has created a buzz in the auto industry for the daring use of aluminium in their most popular vehicle. Although the move was primarily to improve fuel efficiency of the vehicle with the lightweight body, it will also have a positive impact in recycling.

The pick-up tuck is the most talked about vehicle to hit the road in recent times as Ford has gone to great lengths to create and introduce the car to the public. A lot of investment has gone into the project that holds a fair amount of risk. However, there are signs that the F-150 is worth the effort. For starters, by the time the new truck exits the factory and hits the showroom, there will be $300 worth scrap left behind in the factory.

Aluminium, being a highly recyclable metal, can be implemented into a “closed loop” system where the end product can be used as raw materials for new products with no loss of characteristics and quality which helps justify the use of the metal that is much higher than steel.

“Every single scrap of aluminum is reused,” Chief Executive Mr. Fields said in an interview. “The more you can reuse or recycle, it makes it a more compelling business case.”

The body panels of the vehicle are stamped out of the six-foot-wide aluminium rolls with only about 60-65% of the roll being used as many body panels come with big hole for things like windows. This gives rise to thousands of pounds of shredded aluminium in a busy plant like Dearborn, Mich. that rolls out 50 semi tractor-trailer worth of F-150s.

Ford has taken special care to install systems to separate the six different alloys used in the vehicle and send them to the Iowa or New York mills. There they are recycled back into aluminium sheets and delivered to the Dearborn stamping plant.