DETROIT – Ford Motor plans to restart manufacturing of its electrical F-150 Lightning pickup on March 13 – greater than a month after a battery subject brought on one of many autos to catch fireplace.

The automaker on Thursday informed CNBC the manufacturing timeline will enable its battery provider, SK On, to construct up manufacturing and ship battery packs to the Michigan plant the place the truck is produced.

The hearth occurred Feb. 4 in a holding lot throughout a pre-delivery high quality verify whereas the car was charging. Ford suspended manufacturing of the autos and issued a stop-shipment to sellers. Ford declined to reveal particulars of the problem that brought on the car to catch fireplace or of the carried out resolution. The corporate beforehand mentioned engineers decided there was no proof of a charging fault.

“Within the weeks forward, we are going to proceed to use our learnings and work with SK On’s staff to make sure we proceed delivering high-quality battery packs – right down to the battery cells. As REVC ramps up manufacturing, we are going to proceed holding already-produced autos whereas we work by means of engineering and elements updates,” Ford mentioned in an announcement to CNBC.

Ford final week introduced SK had began constructing battery cells once more at a plant in Georgia however mentioned the automaker would prolong downtime at its Rouge Electrical Automobile Middle, the place the F-150 Lightning is constructed, by means of no less than this week.

The F-150 Lightning is being intently watched by buyers, because it’s the primary mainstream electrical pickup truck in the marketplace and a serious launch for Ford. The battery subject provides to ongoing “execution points” detailed to buyers final month by Ford CEO Jim Farley that crippled the automaker’s fourth-quarter earnings.

Ford initially opened buyer reservations for the F-150 Lightning when it was revealed in Could 2021. Greater than 200,000 reservations have been positioned previous to Ford briefly closing the method to try to align manufacturing with anticipated demand.

Many reservation house owners are nonetheless ready for his or her autos, as Ford mentioned earlier Thursday it is bought fewer than 20,000 of the all-electric vehicles since they went on sale final yr.