The owners of 146 battery operated Ford F-150 Cartridges made by a failed converter in Brisbane have been thrown to the rescue by another Queensland company – but they will have to pay for a recall to stop them literally burning their fingers.
After the end of F-150 Lightning production in the USA, local converter AUSEVwent into receivership on March 17, a week before it issued a nationwide product safety recall on March 24 warning owners not to use DC fast chargers due to the risk of burns from overheated charging port pins.
“For vehicles equipped with a Combined Charging System (CCS2) charging port, rapid charging with high-power direct current (DC) may result in increased electrical resistance, resulting in overheating of the internal charging contacts,” the recall notice said at the time.
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Owners were instructed to charge their vehicles using only AC power, a process that could take up to four days using a household outlet.
“Please avoid charging the vehicle with DC fast chargers. Use AC charging instead,” the recall notice says.
“If a person has direct contact with the overheated charging port pins immediately after a charge, there is a risk of burns or serious injury.”
However, AUSEV parent company BossCap had filed for bankruptcy a week earlier and its public website no longer loads, emails to the information address are bounced back to senders, and calls to the company’s phone number are automatically forwarded to voicemail, leaving affected owners in the dark as to how their vehicles can be repaired.
According to an update to the original recall notice dated March 30, owners are now directed to have their vehicles repaired by Performax International, another independent Queensland pickup truck converter based in Gympie.
“In the interest of public safety, Performax has offered its services to repair the vehicles affected by this recall,” the updated recall notice states.
However, it adds that “costs may apply for these repairs” as Performax “has not designed or modified or supplied these vehicles to the Australian market”.
The recall notice lists the supplier of the F-150 Lightning as “AUSEV PTY LTD (Company in Receivership)” and encourages owners of affected vehicles to contact Performax by email at Warranty@performax.com.au to arrange an appointment to have their vehicle inspected.
A complete list of vehicle identification numbers for the 146 vehicles involved in the recall can be found here.
Founded in Queensland in 2012, BossCap is the owner of AUSEV, which was best known for importing electric F-150 Lightnings and converting them to right-hand drive in the Brisbane suburb of Brendale. The subsidiary counted Brisbane Airport and BHP among its customers.
In a statement to Yahoo Finance, BossCap – also the company behind Advanced Manufacturing Queensland – blamed the Blue Oval, citing “the sudden change in Ford’s global manufacturing strategy”.
Ford confirmed it had discontinued the F-150 Lightning in mid-December 2025 after less than four years in production as part of a strategic shift to battery-electric vehicles – with the US auto giant instead focusing on developing electric models with gasoline generators, better known as extended-range electric vehicles (EREVs), for segments like this.
Despite “strong market interest and increasing sales”, the liquidators claimed that the inability to deliver vehicles had “significantly disrupted the company’s future pipeline”.
AUSEV’s conversion and distribution of F-150 Lightning vehicles is unrelated to the gasoline V6-powered F-150s that are officially “remanufactured” for and sold by Ford Australia. AUSEV vehicles are not covered by the Blue Oval’s five-year factory warranty.
While the company had been focused on selling the F-150 Lightning to fleet customers, just a day before BossCap was placed into receivership, AUSEV posted a picture of customers taking delivery of their electric pickup, advertising the vehicle from $109,990 before on-road costs.
“Just a few current customer deliveries and many more to come,” AUSEV said in a social media post, suggesting that many in the organization were unaware of the impending closure. It is assumed that around 100 employees are affected.
“The F-150 Lightning is arriving across Australia, ushering in real change in the future of trucks,” the post reads.
Within days, BossCap’s creditors had initiated insolvency proceedings – which is different from voluntary administration.
“We regret to announce that BossCap Group was placed into receivership on March 17, 2026,” the receivers said in a statement Yahoo Finance.
“Accordingly, operations have been suspended while the liquidators undertake an assessment of the business. At this time, BossCap is unable to undertake warranty repair work.”
AUSEV was formerly known as AUSMV before being renamed as part of the transition to electric vehicles.
BossCap’s subsidiary SCD Remanufactured Vehicles – which previously imported and converted various American internal combustion engine models to right-hand drive, including the Ram 1500 and Dodge Challenger – completed the local conversions in March 2024.
Like Harrison F-Trucks, which contracts Melbourne-based converter Vehicle Development Corporation (VDC) to refurbish its vehicles, Performax was a major retailer of remanufactured Ford F-Series pickups until Ford Australia relaunched the F-150 after contracting Melbourne-based RMA Automotive to refurbish its vehicles in 2023.
The other three full-size US pickups officially sold here – the Ram 1500/2500 from Ram Trucks Australia, the Chevrolet Silverado from GM Specialty Vehicles and the Tundra from Toyota Australia – are all developed and remanufactured on a contract basis by Walkinshaw Automotive in Melbourne.
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