First Drive Review for 2015 Ford F-250 Super Duty Diesel

Pickup buyers in general fall into individual of two categories: Weekend Warriors and Heavy Haulers. While the former are primarily outdoorsy types, DIYers, and recreational-minded persons with toys to yank, inhabit in the latter arrange rack up many thousands of miles trailering livestock, campers, and contracting or homestead equipment. Weekend Warriors more often than not observe all the capability they need in half-ton trucks like the ford F-150, Ram 1500, and Chevrolet Silverado 1500. Heavy Haulers, on the other supply, take care of to opt for I beg your pardon? We still call the one-ton genre of trucks: Dedicated workhorses to facilitate can be equipped with dual rear wheels and torque-happy diesel engines, trucks to facilitate place freight and towing function on the top of their slope of priorities. But at hand is a core ground, and in the ford Trucks lineup to facilitate ground is occupied by the F-250 Super Duty.

The Same, But Different

It’s believed to facilitate familiarity breeds contempt, but you’d on no account know to facilitate by the in the main unchanged interior and outer of the F-250, which was updated for 2015. The styling remains comprised of the lifeless surfaces and near-right angles to facilitate bear befit a make of ford’s Super Duty trucks more than the very last decade or so, and the automaker says that’s the way customers like it. There’s certainly rejection mistaking the ford’s log cabin for the deluxe interior of the current Ram HD or the comparatively stark and minimalist interior in the Chevy Silverado HD. The F-250 we drove was a ruler Ranch kind, and although the leather felt accomplished, the seat shapes and sitting room positions weren’t as engaging or—gasp!—as carlike as persons of the competitors. Of the three, the Ram on slightest feels the widest for hips and shoulders, the Chevy the tightest.

Under the top of our F-250 was the same 6.7-liter Power Stroke diesel free in its F-350 Super Duty and F-450 Super Duty large brothers. (You can still understand the 6.2-liter gasoline V-8 in the F-250 and F-350, but we drove individual the diesel this instance.) ford prodded the Power Stroke for 2015 to deliver 440 horsepower and 860 lb-ft of hairy-chested torque, relying on the usual tricks for its up-to-the-minute disk-shaped of one-upmanship: A better turbo, spanking fuel injector tips, a more accurate exhaust-gas hotness sensor, and a revised fuel pump. An improved torque converter helps the TorqShift six-speed automatic transmission carry out the diesel’s prodigious output.

 

With to facilitate much power on tap and a stout frame underneath, even 1000 pounds of empty authority in the bed couldn’t ruin the fun. Our Crew Cab F-250 4x4 laughed rotten the freight as child’s take part in, although the accumulation was felt after accelerating testing absent of turns. (Max freight for our test truck’s configuration is 3250 pounds.) Considering the massive torque on supply, shifting is almost a secondary consideration, but the six-speed detachment encouraged from cog to cog seamlessly, on no account leaving us defective for a atypical gear—one minus machine to discomfort on the order of after pulling a clip. Put your walking boot into it and the truck simply surges forward, a feeling we skilled even on the steep uphill sections of our drive. Honestly, the ford delivers more muscle than almost some user will eternally need, but HD-truck output records, like oxidation, on no account catnap.

A button to the reasonable of the steering circle activates the exhaust brake to help care for race on downhill sections, but individual must on no account allow it quiet period you into self-righteousness. Being a ford engineer riding shotgun in an informal way mentioned regarding towing trailers on long, steep descents: “There’s continually possible for a runaway state of affairs.” Compared with the current offerings from Ram and Chevy, the Power Stroke is the quietest of the bunch, although we believe to facilitate the Duramax diesel in the current Chevy HD makes the largely apt “diesel truck” engine sound on idle.

The ride firms up faintly after the truck is unburdened, but it’s still more refined than a vehicle with this kind of freight function has some reasonable to be. Highway travel is a rich business, with little to rejection wind or engine clatter seeping into the passenger compartment. The steering is complete and accurate, but in a vehicle of this size it’s more on the order of getting the job completed safely than nailing apexes. Still, we had to give out it a go off: On a long, winding two-track, we engaged four-wheel drive and allow it rip, upcoming away impressed by the workhorse’s quickness, excepting the part wherever the road whack a empty close and we considered necessary a spotter and a several-point focus to understand the 20-foot-long beast wheeled around. And we’ll moreover supply absent kudos to the brakes, which, even with the rear wheels safe up on damp pavement—were you napping, ABS?—keep the truck pointed straight in the course of heavy-footed stops.

Pecking Order

So I beg your pardon? Separates the F-250 from the heavier-duty Super Duty rigs? Hip unfriendly, towing capability. With a fifth-wheel/gooseneck ceiling tow rating of 16,800 pounds, the single-rear-wheel-only F-250 is ample clever, but it’s rejection match for the red pulling power of its diesel F-350 and F-450 large brothers, which are rated to yank an absurd 26,700 and 31,200 pounds after equipped with dual rear wheels. Interestingly, usual towing via a traditional globe hitch reveals a more tightly grouped appoint of information: The F-250 tops absent on 14,000 pounds, the F-350 and F-450 both on 19,000 pounds. (Note: Ram has very soon announced it will start rating its HD trucks by the SAE J2807 towing standard. The ford information quoted at this juncture are manufacturer supplied and not J2807 compliant.) Lest you think we are overemphasizing the magnitude of tow ratings, consider to facilitate ford says, “90 percent of all Super Duty trucks are purchased by customers who tow often.” It’s for to facilitate motive to facilitate towing stats show the way truckmakers’ advertising blitzes.

Overall, the F-250 makes a strong pencil case for buyers who make sure of a little Heavy Hauling connecting stints as a Weekend Warrior. Sometimes riding a rail reasonable down the core isn’t such a bad machine.

source: caranddriver.com
images credits: source: caranddriver.com
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