Enlarge / Like the FedEx arrow or the elephant in GM's new logo, once you see the bandito mustache, you'll never unsee it. (credit: Jonathan Gitlin)

Last year, Ford issued a recall for almost 49,000 Mustang Mach-E crossovers due to a problem with the electric vehicles' high-voltage battery contactors. The automaker's fix was a software update to two control modules on the Mach-E, but on Monday Reuters reported that the National Highway Traffic Safety Administration's Office of Defects Investigation has opened a recall query to see if Ford's software recall actually did the job.

On June 21, 2022, Ford issued a recall for 48,924 Mustang Mach-Es, also instructing dealerships to stop delivering the EVs to customers until the software fix was ready. The problem was battery contactors that could overheat during DC fast charging or with repeated use of full throttle; that overheating could lead to either arcing or the contact surfaces deforming, which in turn could lead to a complete loss of power while driving.

According to the recall safety notice , Ford had 286 warranty claims for open or welded contactors between July 2021 and May 2022. Ford's fix was a software update to the secondary on-board diagnostic control module and the battery energy control module.

Enlarge / Ford has gone for a high-tech interior for the next Mustang, and AM radio did not make the cut. (credit: Ford)

You have to hand it to AM radio—it has outlasted the 8-track, the cassette, and the compact disc as a way to deliver audio content to a car. This first-generation radio broadcast technology dates back to the dawn of the last century before it was superseded by FM, which has better sound fidelity and is less likely to suffer from interference.

But good old amplitude modulation joins those shiny CDs and twisted tapes on the scrapheap of history, at least as far as the next Ford Mustang is concerned. When the 2024 Mustang goes on sale this summer, it will do so without an AM radio function, according to Ford Authority .

That will make it the second Ford to lose access to this antique broadcast option. After including it in the first model year 2022 F-150 Lightning electric pickup trucks, Ford dropped AM for MY2023 onward. Other electric vehicles have notably dropped AM radio—Tesla moved away from including it in new cars in 2018, as did BMW with its i3 city car, citing the potential for electromagnetic interference (EMI) from the EV powertrain. (AM radio is a feature on plenty of other EVs, so this explanation is unconvincing.)

Enlarge / Yes, I am aware that photographing an electric car in front of an electricity power station is a cliché. Sorry. (credit: Jonathan Gitlin)

I wasn't expecting the Ford Mustang Mach-E to draw quite as much attention as it did. Over the past few months, I've driven some wild-looking cars, but more people pulled out their camera phones to capture the Mach-E drive pass than they did for the McLaren GT . When stopped in traffic, the Mach-E garnered more curious questions—from other drivers, as well as pedestrians—than did the Polaris Slingshot . Ford's new battery electric vehicle definitely has mindshare, no doubt helped by the fact that over a year has passed since the production version was first unveiled to the public in November 2019 .

I don't think I'm being hyperbolic when I say the Mach-E might be the most important new car of the year. The ubiquity of Ford dealerships makes the Mach-E accessible to people in parts of the country where brands like Tesla or Polestar have yet to reach (although, like its startup rivals, the Mach-E is configured and ordered online, not bought from a forecourt). The influence of Tesla is evident in more than just the sales process, too; the Mach-E's minimalist interior is almost button-free and dominated by a large touchscreen. But the vehicle still offers the familiarity of the Mustang name and some of the sports car's design cues to go with it, like the distinctive triple-barred tail lights.

Not everyone is on board with the Mach-E being called a Mustang. Car people in particular are unhappy that the long and storied name has been attached to a five-door crossover, not a two-door coupe. But Ford wants to sell the Mach-E to the mainstream, and the car-buying public at large wants crossovers, so here we are. Personally, I'm more upset that, over in Europe, Ford chose to resurrect the Puma as a crossover—I offer this anecdote only to show that, to normal people, we sound a bit obsessed when we complain about stuff like this. (Also, the fact is that plenty of Mustangs have been unexciting cars, as anyone who ever rented a V6-powered one in the mid-2000s will attest.)

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