Ford Rant

[RoyJackson]

Steve Irwin drove one of these..

P.S. These commercial Toyota 4x4's have been prettied up to much for my liking. I prefered the look of the previous model with the separate flat top front guards. They were 'all business'. That was probably the model you saw Steve Irwin in.

Yeah, the SUV market in the US isn't directed toward off road use. You'll see the commercials of them flying through the hinterlands, but most never go more off road then the owner's driveway.

The only reason I have 4WD is for snow...my SUV (Ford Explorer in my case) never hits the trails. But I do prefer the lean and mean look Alchemysa likes.

One of the more preposterous things I see is those folks with Hummers.They'd make a great farm or ranch truck, but they look foolish in an urban/suburban environment (IMHO)

 

[texasjohn]

Roy....you said it.... in several posts.... I get the feeling we could sit down over a brewskii and BBQ and tell some good stories!

 

[RoyJackson]

Roy....you said it.... in several posts.... I get the feeling we could sit down over a brewskii and BBQ and tell some good stories!

You bet!!!

 

[tlbuser]

TLBuser,

I agree the motor has not been out long in this formate, but it is pretty impressive to me how little trouble the engine has had so far. It is a solid motor, regardless of Ford/Navistar's marital issues. The engine has been used and tested for some time. As I have noted in a post some time ago, a friend of mine did turbo testing for Navistar on this exact engine and turbo combination, in 2003!!! So, for those who think this is a new and untested motor, it is not. As each of you know as well this engine is fairly close akin to the cab over Power Stroke, which I think has been in use for a while now. So six months is true in this application but is not a true reflection of the time the engine has been in operation.

John M

Well, which format are you referring to? The Maxxforce maybe? In a lab on a dyno / bench test in 2003. Ok, when was the first production run available to the general public?

Not saying it's a bad engine, let's give it some street time in the hands of everyday people before we start claiming too much. D-max (GM/Isuzu) was real proud of their first and second gen's. too.

 

[jcmseven]

I agree with you 100%. But these engines are getting some road time in. One of my patients, who is the service manager at one of local large dealers is already seeing a number of trucks coming in with 20-30K, or more, miles on them. I realize that in diesel terms that is not much but he (and others I know) have been impressed to this point with how few issues they have seen so far. My friend did bench testing and complete motor testing both on bench and in vehicle. Most of the test mule work was done after 2005, but he said the engine was an extremely good service motor, certainly to this point the best of any of the Ford light truck diesels (to this point). I suppose my original point was that one cannot assume that a new motor will automatically have big problems. This might have been true some years ago, but with computer aided testing and design as well as improvements in production, etc. most of the major issues seen are from bygone days (of course provided production standards are met).

John M